Liberia •

Ethiopian Health Works Reached Liberia to Wipe Out Ebola

December 17, 2014 By Rebecca McGhee Leave a Comment

A group of Ethiopian Health workers reached Liberia on Tuesday. The main aim of the workers is to motivate other nations and wipe out this deadly outburst.

African Union is all set to join hands with a team of 87 doctors and nurses. Thus far, nearly 6,800 people died in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia due to this lethal disease. The concerned authorities intend to wipe out the virus before Christmas.

The team of doctors and nurses will join other health staff of Sierra Leona and Liberia before the end of December.

Major General Julius Oketta, the director of the African Union Ebola mission stated that the primary goal of these paramedic staff is to support the government in the fight with Ebola. The officials plan to speed up the mission to get rid of this virus as soon as possible. Additionally, these health workers will strive hard to spread out the mission.

The greater part of the efforts of African Union took place in Liberia. Currently, Monsterrado County, which is the one of the biggest city, is the main focus of the officials.

The recent fall in the cases of Ebola elevated the hopes of the health authorities. It is a big indication that soon all the African countries would be free of this fatal disease.

Tolbert Nyenswah, the assistant health minister of Liberia informs that their topmost goal is to cut down the number of Ebola cases to zero. Presently, Liberia witness around five to ten cases to Ebola every day.

Cuban Doctor heals successfully against Ebola in Geneva

December 6, 2014 By Rebecca McGhee Leave a Comment

A Cuban doctor makes a full recovery against the deadly Ebola virus at a local hospital in Geneva, and is already enroute to meet up with his family members back home on Saturday.

Dr. Felix Baez was amongst the 256 Cuban doctors and nurses who participated in relief activities against the Ebola outburst in West Africa earlier this year. The outbreak which has killed more than 6,000 people till date is one of the worst recorded.

At the request of the World Health Organization WHO, Baez was hospitalized in Geneva, whose head office is also situated in the city.

Dr. Baez contracted the disease in the worst hit country Sierra Leone. 106 out of a total of 138 health workers who caught the disease in Sierra Leone, have died, resulting in a much higher fatality rate than among health workers in the neighboring Guinea and Liberia.

At the hospital in Geneva, Baez received two drugs to fight the disease and spokesman said he was feeling much better after two days of treatment. Amongst the two drugs, one was the Canadian experimental ZMab and the other was the untested Favipiravir made by Japan’s Fujifilm. ZMab is a precursor to ZMapp, which has been used to treat several U.S. patients as well. While Favipiravir is included by WHO in its list of potential Ebola treatments.

Baez was the first case of Ebola in Switzerland and also Cuba’s first citizen to contract the deadly disease. He was treated in complete isolation at the hospital and at no point in time was there any risk of transmission to the masses.

Clinical Trial of Ebola Antiviral Drugs Will Begin in December

November 13, 2014 By Jason Leathers Leave a Comment

Doctors without Boards declared that researchers intend to begin the clinical experiment of two Ebola therapies in December. Experts expect to get the results of the three experimental drugs till the end of February 2015.

The medical humanitarian group informed that the tests will be carried out on the patients of treatment center of Guinea. The Ebola outburst slammed Guinea really badly.

As per the reports of World Health Organization around 15,000 Ebola cases are diagnosed in Guinea, Sierra Leona and Liberia.

The studies will examine the therapies that are currently in use of Europe and USA for the cure of Ebola. These antiviral drugs are brincidofvir and favipiravir. The Chinmerix Inc of Durham developed brincidofovir in order to treat the infections DNA containing virus. It is considered as the modified version of an antiviral drug known as cidofovir. It averts the progression of several DNA viruses such as herpes viruses and poxviruses.

On the other hand, favipiravir is manufactured by Toyama Chemical Unit situated in Japan. It is a medicine which is utilized for the cure of influenza, West Nile Virus, Yellow fever Virus and foot and mouth disease. Currently, the dug is being sold under the name of Avigan.

Researchers will observe the number of patients that survived after the use of these medications. Moreover, experts notified that they are presently designing the appropriate method for this experiment.

End of Ebola Crisis in Dallas

November 8, 2014 By Rebecca McGhee 1 Comment

Dallas officially marked the end of its Ebola crisis.

George W.Bush, former President visited the hospital to congratulate the doctors. She was one of the 177 people who were being observed for the risk of catching Ebola.

The Texas Department of State Health expressed that they are glad to finish this Ebola chapter with Dallas. The agency gave the good news through its twitter account.

Earlier, U.S Centers for Disease Control and Prevention informed that 176 of 177 people cleared the Ebola symptoms test. They were under observation for nearly 21 days for this particular purpose. 21 days are considered as the maximum time for an infection to develop a disease.

The residents of Texas began to worry when Thomas Eric Duncan was diagnosed with this deadly disease. Duncan was a Liberian man who came to visit America for a short time period. Unfortunately, the man died on the 8^th of October in the hospital.

Moreover, Bush stated that last few weeks were really dangerous for the people who live in Texas.

Later on, two other Duncan’s nurses were infected with Ebola at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital. Luckily, the two nurses Vinson and Nina Pham made full recovery.

Thus far, Ebola has taken the precious lives of nearly 5000 people in Western Africa. On the other hand, up till now the disease has infected approximately 13,000 people in Liberia.

Facebook’s new Ebola donate feature would help to raise direct funds for Ebola affected West Africa

November 6, 2014 By Jason Leathers Leave a Comment

Facebook has announced a new Donate feature for curtailing the deadly Ebola disease. This feature would soon start popping up on Facebook user’s News Feeds. This initiative highlights three charitable organizations to direct funds: International Medical Corps, American Red Cross, and Save the Children.

Earlier, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg also donated $25 million to the Centers for Disease control and Prevention towards the Ebola crisis, and he is not stopping on that as well because he wants people to take out time from liking their friends wedding or baby photos in order to take the Ebola cause seriously.

Facebook is also collaborating with UNICEF on an education campaign to integrate into users News Feeds that will educate the public on Ebola symptoms and the outbreak’s status in Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone.

Medical workers in afflicted countries will also benefit directly from Facebook’s coming emergency communications capacity to improve voice and data services in collaboration with NetHope.

“Response organizations estimate that for each patient, at least 10 other people will provide health care, contact tracing and other services that may require telecommunications, and improvements are most important in rural areas where infrastructure is weakest and case loads are highest,” Naomi Gleit, VP of Product Management and Chris Daniels, VP of Internet.org, said in a statement on the new initiatives.

Why U.S. Ebola Patients Recover Quicker Than Those in West Africa? 3 Possible Reasons!

October 29, 2014 By Rebecca McGhee Leave a Comment

CNN reported that medical experts have several theories on why, just one patient, Thomas Eric Duncan has died with the Ebola virus in the United States with all 8 other patients treated in U.S hospitals either recovering or still alive, regardless of Ebola’s distressing body count in West Africa.

Possible reasons include:

The two Dallas nurses, Amber Vinson and Nina Pham, who cared for Duncan, were 29 and 26, respectively. Bruce Ribner, M.D., of Emory University Hospital in Atlanta, who treated Vinson, told CNN “We know from a lot of data coming out Africa that younger patients do much better than patients who are older.”
Duncan was not treated in one of the 4 hospitals that made special preparations for diseases like Ebola over a period of years.
As compared to 4 other U.S. patients who received the medication immediately, Duncan did not receive it until 6 days after his admission to the hospital. Robert Murphy, director of the Center for Global Health at Northwestern University in Chicago, told USA Today, “Mr. Duncan had an unfortunate delay in diagnosis and did not receive an experimental therapy until just before he died. That’s why we did not help his case.”

In addition to Duncan and the two Dallas nurses, U.S. Ebola patients include a New York City doctor and American missionaries who helped care for Ebola patients in West Africa.

According to NBC News, containing the outbreak in Africa is vitally important to prevent its spread. Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf told NBC News, “In spite of the good news for U.S. patients, “if … this disease spreads, then we’re all in trouble.” Liberia has been hardest-hit by the outbreak.

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