Ebola news 9/5

[Buster's Uncle]

EU sharply increases aid for Ebola-hit West Africa
AFP
By Lachlan Carmichael  2 hours ago



Medical workers from the Liberian Red Cross carry the body of a victim of the Ebola virus on September 4, 2014 in Banjol, 30 kilometres outside Monrovia (AFP Photo/Dominique Faget)



Brussels (AFP) - The European Union on Friday announced 140 million euros ($183 million) in funds to fight the deadly Ebola virus in West Africa, a sharp increase over its previous pledge as the outbreak worsens.

The EU commission said the aid was necessary to help stop the "worst ever outbreak of the epidemic" from ravaging Guinea, Sierra Leone, Liberia and Nigeria.

"Today the commission is unveiling a 140-million-euro package of funding for all the countries currently affected by the Ebola virus," said David Sharrock, spokesman for the Humanitarian Aid Commission, at a briefing.

The aid is designed to boost overstretched health services, fund mobile laboratories for detecting the disease, safeguard the provision of food, water and sanitation as well as help the broader economy and strengthen overall public services.

"An essential part of halting the epidemic is getting support to the health services," said Sharrock.

About a third of the assistance would go towards strengthening healthcare systems in affected countries, he said.

Sharrock said the EU had previously committed 12 million euros in aid to fight Ebola, with the sharp increase reflecting the gravity of the crisis.

"A crisis caused by the Ebola virus is threatening the entire region. This is the worst outbreak ever of the epidemic," Sharrock said.

The World Health Organization put the official Ebola death toll at 1,841, out of a total of 3,685 cases in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia.

Kristalina Georgieva, EU Commissioner for Humanitarian Aid, said the situation in the Ebola zone was "going from bad to worse."

"We are helping make a difference on the ground, but the needs are outpacing the international community's capacity to react," she said in a statement.

"We need to pool our efforts and provide adequate air transportation and medical equipment to our partners in order to fight this menace."

The formal announcement of the increased aid was made by Development Commissioner Andris Piebalgs, during a trip to Benin.

Eight million of the funds pledged Friday were included in the previous 12 million euro commitment, EU officials said.

Several European specialists have already been deployed to Guinea and Nigeria to run mobile laboratories that help detect cases of Ebola, the officials added. Another team is due to arrive in Liberia next week.

The EU's executive said last month that the risk of Ebola across the European Union remained "extremely low" despite the WHO's decision to declare it an international health emergency.

At a summit in Brussels last week, the EU's 28 leaders called for better coordination of assistance made by member states and requested that airlines keep links to the affected countries still running.


http://news.yahoo.com/eu-pledges-140-mn-euros-ebola-hit-west-000929929.html

[Buster's Uncle]

UN goal: Stop Ebola transmission in 6-9 months
Associated Press
By EDITH M. LEDERER and CLARENCE ROY-MACAULAY  17 minutes ago



A health worker, right, sprays a man with disinfectant chemicals as he is suspected of dying due to the Ebola virus as people, rear, look on in Monrovia, Liberia, Thursday, Sept. 4, 2014. As West Africa struggles to contain the biggest ever outbreak of Ebola, some experts say an unusual but simple treatment might help: the blood of survivors. The evidence is mixed for using infection-fighting antibodies from survivors' blood for Ebola, but without any licensed drugs or vaccines for the deadly disease, some say it's worth a shot. (AP Photo/Abbas Dulleh)



UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The United Nations is establishing an "Ebola Crisis Center" with a goal of stopping transmission in affected countries within six to nine months, the U.N. chief said Friday, as the death toll from the outbreak surpassed 2,000 for the first time.

The World Health Organization said the number of people who have died in the outbreak has reached 2,097 across five West Africa countries, with about half the deaths in Liberia.

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told reporters after a meeting with senior U.N. leaders that $600 million is urgently needed for supplies to combat Ebola in West Africa.

He again urged airlines and shipping countries to lift their bans on flights and port visits so doctors, nurses, beds, medical equipment and supplies can reach those in need.

"This is a huge serious challenge," he said. "We are organizing to meet it and I am convinced we can succeed."

The New York-based Ebola Crisis Center will coordinate efforts of the U.N., aid organizations, governments, the private sector, financial institutions and other grassroots groups to bring "synergy and efficiency" to the effort to end the outbreak, he said.

"The number of cases is rising exponentially," Ban said. "The disease is spreading far faster than the response. People are increasingly frustrated that it is not being controlled."

In Sierra Leone, a physician said Friday that health care in the capital city of Freetown has "crumbled" because the Ebola outbreak has made people too terrified to go to hospitals and some doctors are wary of treating those who do show up.

Speaking at the launch of a public education program in Freetown, Kwame O'Neil said patients suffering from all kinds of ailments are dying for lack of treatment because of these fears.

One young girl died of appendicitis when, after showing up at a hospital, a doctor there denied he was a doctor and refused to treat her, O'Neil said, and his own aunt died after suffering a stroke and being left untreated at a hospital for two days.

Ebola is a deadly disease for which there is no known cure and which is spread through contact with bodily fluids.

Sierra Leone has recorded 1,107 confirmed cases and 430 confirmed deaths of Ebola, according to the World Health Organization. But the country's health ministry says most are outside the capital.

In Liberia, officials confirmed Friday that a police barracks in central Monrovia was shut down after the wife of one of the officers died of Ebola.

Information Minister Lewis Brown said the officers decided to "self-quarantine." About 35 officers live in the barracks with their families, said Abraham Kromah, deputy director of the national police force.

Liberian Christian leaders planned to convene about 100 "prayer warriors" at a historic church in the capital to drive out Ebola, said Rev. Kortu Brown, vice president of the Liberian Council of Churches.

The event was being held at the Providence Baptist Church, where Liberia's declaration of independence was signed in 1847.

"It is where Liberia has always prayed in the past when it was confronted," Brown said.

A state of emergency in Liberia restricts public gatherings, though church services have largely continued unimpeded.

In an article published in Time magazine, Dr. Kent Brantly, an American who contracted Ebola in Liberia and who survived after receiving an experimental treatment in the United States, said the world needs to act.

"Ebola has changed everything in West Africa," Brantly wrote in his first-person account. "We cannot sit back and say, 'Oh, those poor people.' We must think outside the box and find ways to help."

__

Jonathan Paye-Layleh contributed to this report from Monrovia, Liberia.


http://news.yahoo.com/ebola-ravages-health-care-sierra-leone-capital-141810349.html

[Buster's Uncle]

US doctor infected with Ebola arrives in Nebraska
Associated Press
By MARGERY A. BECK  3 hours ago



OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — A doctor who became infected with Ebola while working in Liberia — the third American aid worker sickened with the virus — arrived Friday at a Nebraska hospital for treatment.

Officials at the Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha have said Dr. Rick Sacra, 51, will be treated at the hospital's 10-bed special isolation unit, the largest of four such units in the U.S.

Sacra, a doctor from suburban Boston who spent 15 years working at the Liberia hospital where he fell ill, felt compelled to return after hearing that two other missionaries were sick. Sacra delivered babies at the hospital, but was not involved in the treatment of Ebola patients, so it's unclear how he became infected with the virus that has killed about 1,900 people.

The plane carrying Sacra landed shortly after 6 a.m. Friday at Offutt Air Force Base, south of the Omaha suburb of Bellevue. He arrived at the hospital in an ambulance about 40 minutes later, but media were unable to see Sacra as he was hustled into the facility.

Dr. Phil Smith, medical director of the Omaha unit, said a team of 35 doctors, nurses and other medical staffers will provide Sacra with basic care, including ensuring he is hydrated and keeping his vital signs stable.

The team is discussing experimental treatments, including using blood serum from a patient who has recovered from Ebola, Smith said.

"We've been trying to collect as much information on possible treatments as we can," Smith said.

There are no licensed drugs or vaccines for the disease, but about half a dozen are in development. None has been tested on humans, but an early trial of one vaccine began this week in the United States.

Much attention has focused on the unproven drug ZMapp, which was given to seven patients, two of whom died. But the limited supply is now exhausted and its developer says it will take months to make even a modest amount.

The first two American aid workers infected by Ebola — Dr. Kent Brantly and Nancy Writebol — have recovered since being flown to Emory University Hospital in Atlanta for treatment.

Smith and several other doctors with the unit repeatedly said Sacra's transfer to Omaha posed no threat to the public, noting Ebola is transmitted through close contact with an infected person.

He said Sacra was in stable condition in Liberia and was able to board the plane to the U.S. under his own power.

SIM's president, Bruce Johnson, said Sacra had received excellent care in Liberia, but that the Nebraska facility has advanced monitoring equipment and can provide more treatment options.

Sacra's wife, Debbie, said at a news conference at the University of Massachusetts Medical Center in Worcester that her husband was in good spirits as he boarded the plane Thursday. She said the couple had known there was a risk of Ebola infection when he left for Liberia in August.

"I knew he needed to be with the Liberian people," she said. "He was so concerned about the children that were going to die from malaria without hospitalization and the women who had no place to go to deliver their babies by cesarean section. He's not someone who can stand back if there's a need he can take care of."


http://news.yahoo.com/us-doctor-infected-ebola-heading-nebraska-054216448.html

[Buster's Uncle]

World health experts study untested Ebola drugs
AFP
By Nina Larson  4 hours ago



Medical workers from the Liberian Red Cross carry the body of a victim of the Ebola virus on September 4, 2014 in Banjol, 30 kilometres outside Monrovia (AFP Photo/Dominique Faget)



Geneva (AFP) - Health experts honed in Friday on a handful of unproven drugs they hope might turn the lethal tide of Ebola, as key figures urged that funds go for frontline crisis care in some of the world's poorest states.

On the second and last day of talks in Geneva, the World Health Organization-led group discussed fast-tracking two potential vaccines and eight potential therapies, including the drug ZMapp that has been used on a handful of frontline workers.

With no fully tested treatments for Ebola, the WHO has endorsed rushing out potential cures like ZMapp -- a call echoed by African doctors battling the epidemic that has taken some 1,900 lives so far.

"Everybody keeps asking why isn't this medication made available to our people out there?" Samuel Kargbo, from Sierra Leone's ministry of health, told AFP.

The WHO said "extraordinary measures" were in place to accelerate the pace of clinical trials -- but admitted that even that would likely not allow "widespread use before the end of 2014".

Abdulsalami Nasidi, project director at the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control, nevertheless said the Geneva discussion "gives a lot of hope to the African people affected and those who are in panic".

ZMapp has been given to about 10 infected health workers, including Americans and Europeans, of whom three have recovered.

Current stocks are exhausted, but the WHO said a few hundred doses could potentially be ready by the end of the year.


- Short on manpower, supplies -

But beyond experimental drugs, the key to controlling the Ebola outbreak, which began in Guinea and has spread to Liberia, Sierra Leone and Nigeria, was manpower and medical basics.

On Friday the European Union released 140 million euros in aid to combat the disease, a day after the United States offered an additional $75 million to buy beds and bolster treatment centres.

"What is needed? It is health workers. We need treatment centres. We need more, especially in Liberia. Definitely, we need people who will be in treatment centers, but there is also a need for supplies," WHO spokesman Tarik Jasarevic said at a Friday briefing.

The crisis has stirred a fierce debate about how the world should have responded after first reports trickled out from some of the world's poorest countries with dilapidated medical infrastructure.

In a commentary in The Lancet medical journal published Friday, Georgetown University's Lawrence Gostin said the outbreak could have been stopped short if authorities had followed WHO guidelines on global health emergencies.

"How could this Ebola outbreak have been averted and what could states and the international community do to prevent the next epidemic?" asked Gostin.

"The answer is not untested drugs, mass quarantines, or even humanitarian relief," he wrote.

"If the real reasons the outbreak turned into a tragedy of these proportions are human resource shortages and fragile health systems, the solution is to fix these inherent structural deficiencies.”


- Aid workers 'literally exhausted' -

But aid agencies warned that the haemorrhagic fever whose easy spread via body fluids has ravaged frontline workers is still winning the battle.

"The situation continues to get worse, and there is no end in sight," the head of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, Elhadj As Sy, said.

As Say said 1,700 Red Cross volunteers were "literally exhausted" from the hands-on work of treating the infected, retrieving corpses of victims from far-flung sites and fighting rumours on the ground about Ebola.

Doctors Without Borders (Medecins Sans Frontieres, MSF) earlier this week said the world was "losing the battle" to contain the ruthless virus.

Asked for the WHO's reaction to that dire assessment, spokesman Jasarevic responded on Friday: "You could say that we're trailing the illness now, when what we need to do is to be in front of it."


- Many deaths go unreported -

WHO chief Margaret Chan told reporters in Washington on Wednesday the death toll was "more than 1,900".

The WHO, in an official toll on Thursday, counted 1,841 deaths, out of a total of 3,685 cases in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia.

Another seven people died in Nigeria out of 22 cases, while one case has been confirmed in Senegal, it said.

But spokesman Tarik Jasarevic told AFP the official death toll was likely a gross underestimate due to under-reporting, and that it "is estimated that there are two to four times as many people infected with Ebola as reported".

At least 30 more people have died in a separate outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

American doctor Rick Sacra, who was infected while working in hardest-hit Liberia, was due in the United States for treatment on Friday.


http://news.yahoo.com/world-health-experts-study-untested-ebola-drugs-001541793.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Ebola toll tops 2,000, cases near 4,000: World Health Organization
Reuters
33 minutes ago



GENEVA (Reuters) - More than 2,000 people have died in the Ebola outbreak in West Africa, the World Health Organization said on Friday, out of about 4,000 patients thought to have been infected in the three countries worst hit by the disease.

The death toll in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone totaled 2,097 as at Sept 5, out of 3,944 cases, a WHO document said.

A further eight people have died in Nigeria, out of 23 cases, and 1 confirmed case in Senegal. That puts the death toll at a total of 2,105 and the number of patients so far at 3,968.

The WHO said health officials were trying to trace contacts of patients to halt the spread in those two countries, with 400 contacts being followed in the Nigerian cities of Lagos and Port Harcourt and 67 being followed in Senegal.

The sole patient in Senegal was in isolation, as were three patients in Nigeria, all of whom could be traced back to the initial case in Nigeria.

(Reporting by Tom Miles, editing by Stephanie Nebehay)


http://news.yahoo.com/ebola-toll-tops-2-000-cases-near-4-171659242.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Plane carrying third U.S. missionary with Ebola leaves Liberia
Reuters
11 hours ago



MONROVIA (Reuters) - A plane carrying a third U.S. missionary infected with the Ebola virus in Liberia left the West African country's capital on Thursday, and he will be taken to the Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha, the Christian organization SIM USA said.

Dr. Rick Sacra, a 51-year-old Boston physician, is the latest worker for SIM USA to be infected with the virus that has killed more than 1,900 people.

A Reuters cameraman saw Sacra, wearing a white protective overall, step out of the car that brought him to the tarmac. He walked onto the aircraft.

The plane was expected to arrive in Omaha on Friday morning, and Sacra will begin receiving treatment in the hospital’s Biocontainment Patient Care Unit, the organization said in a statement.

"Rick was receiving excellent care from our SIM/ELWA staff in Liberia at our Ebola 2 Care Center," said Bruce Johnson, president of SIM USA.

"They all love and admire him deeply. However, the Nebraska Medical Center provides advanced monitoring equipment and wider availability of treatment options," Johnson said.

Liberian Information Minister Lewis Brown confirmed that the plane carrying Sacra was identical to the Gulfstream jet that ferried Nancy Writebol and Dr. Kent Brantly, who had contracted the disease in July while working at the missionary group's health facilities in Liberia.

Sacra had volunteered to return to Liberia, where he has long offered medical services, when the two other U.S. health workers were infected.

Writebol and Brantly have since recovered after being flown back to the United States for treatment in an isolation unit at Emory University Hospital in Atlanta.

Sacra had not been caring for Ebola patients but was delivering babies, and had been following protocols to prevent the disease, the group said. It was not known how he contracted the disease.

(Reporting by Derick Snyder in Monrovia, Bate Felix and Emma Farge in Dakar and Michele Gershberg; Writing by Bate Felix; Editing by Dominic Evans and Jonathan Oatis)


http://news.yahoo.com/plane-carrying-third-u-missionary-ebola-leaves-liberia-063826280.html

[Buster's Uncle]

US doctor infected with Ebola heading to Nebraska
Associated Press
14 hours ago



Dr. Rick Sacra treating patients in an undated photo taken in Liberia. (SIM)



OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — A doctor who was infected with Ebola while working in Liberia is being flown to a Nebraska hospital for treatment, doctors there said Thursday.

Officials at the Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha said Dr. Rick Sacra, 51, is expected to arrive sometime Friday. Sacra will begin treatment in the hospital's 10-bed special isolation unit, the largest of four such units in the U.S.

Sacra served with North Carolina-based charity SIM. Its president, Bruce Johnson, said Sacra was receiving excellent care at a center in Liberia, but that the Nebraska facility provides advanced monitoring equipment and has a wider availability of treatment options.

Sacra, who's from the Boston area, opted to head to Liberia after hearing that two other missionaries were sick. Sacra wasn't involved in the treatment of Ebola patients but delivered babies, so it's unclear how he got infected with the virus that's killed about 1,900 people.

He's the third American aid worker infected by the Ebola. The first two — Dr. Kent Brantly and Nancy Writebol — have recovered since being flown to Emory University Hospital in Atlanta for treatment.

Dr. Phil Smith, medical director of the Omaha unit, would not say what time or where Sacra would arrive, citing public safety and patient confidentiality concerns. Smith and several other doctors with the unit repeatedly said Sacra's transfer to Omaha posed no threat to the public, noting Ebola is transmitted through close contact with an infected person.

He said Sacra was in stable condition in Liberia and was able to board the plane to the U.S. under his own power, but added, "He has a long plane ride ahead of him."

Doctors in Omaha will focus on providing him basic care, Smith said, including keeping him hydrated and keeping his vital signs stable. Smith said a team of 35 doctors, nurses and other medical staffers will attend to Sacra.

The team is discussing experimental treatments, including using blood serum from a patient who has recovered from Ebola, Smith said.

"We've been trying to collect as much information on possible treatments as we can," Smith said.

There are no licensed drugs or vaccines for the disease, but about a half dozen are in development. None has been tested in humans, but an early trial of one vaccine began this week in the United States.

Much attention has focused on the unproven drug ZMapp, which was given to seven patients, two of whom died. But the limited supply is now exhausted and its developer says it will take months to make even a modest amount.

Sacra's wife, Debbie, said in a news conference at the University of Massachusetts Medical Center in Worcester that her husband was in good spirits as he boarded the plane Thursday. She said the couple had known there was a risk of him getting infected with Ebola when he left for Liberia in August.

"I knew he needed to be with the Liberian people," she said. "He was so concerned about the children that were going to die from malaria without hospitalization and the women who had no place to go to deliver their babies by cesarean section. He's not someone who can stand back if there's a need he can take care of."


http://news.yahoo.com/missionary-infected-ebola-heading-nebraska-205214345.html

[Buster's Uncle]

EU pledges 140 mln euros to fight Ebola in West Africa
Reuters
6 hours ago



Health workers surround an Ebola patient who escaped from quarantine from Monrovia's Elwa hospital, in the centre of Paynesville in this still image taken from a September 1, 2014 video. REUTERS/Reuters TV



ABIDJAN (Reuters) - The European Union promised 140 million euros ($181 million) in assistance on Friday to bolster the overstretched health sectors of four West African nations struggling to halt the worst ever outbreak of the deadly Ebola virus.

The funding will be used to strengthen health systems, train health workers and pay for mobile testing laboratories in Sierra Leone, Liberia, Nigeria and Guinea where over 1,900 people have died since the outbreak was identified in March.

Over 97 million euros will be spent on budget support to Liberia and Sierra Leone in order to help them deliver public services, including healthcare, and maintain macroeconomic stability, the European Commission said in a statement.

"The situation is going from bad to worse," said Kristalina Georgieva, the EU Commissioner for International Cooperation, Humanitarian Aid and Crisis Response. "We are helping make a difference on the ground but the needs are outpacing the international community's capacity to react."

The United Nations said on Wednesday that $600 million would be needed to fight the West African outbreak.

(1 US dollar = 0.7716 euro)


http://news.yahoo.com/eu-pledges-140-mln-euros-fight-ebola-west-105452636.html

[Buster's Uncle]

American Ebola doctor 'sick but stable'
AFP
By Kerry Sheridan  5 minutes ago



This undated photo shows Rick Sacra, a US doctor who is infected with the Ebola virus (AFP Photo/)



Washington (AFP) - An American doctor who came down with Ebola virus while working in a Liberian maternity ward is "sick but stable," US hospital officials said Friday.

Rick Sacra, 51, arrived at the Nebraska Medical Center early Friday, becoming the third US healthcare worker to be evacuated from West Africa amid the largest Ebola outbreak in history.

More than 2,000 people have died from the contagious virus in Liberia, Guinea, Sierra Leone and Nigeria since the beginning of the year, the World Health Organization said.

"Our patient is sick but stable," said Mark Rupp, an infectious disease specialist at Nebraska Medical Center, which maintains a special isolation unit for care of such patients.

"We know that he is seriously ill with a virus that has a fairly high mortality rate associated with it," Rupp told reporters.

"We will continue to care for him with very aggressive supportive care and we are looking into alternatives from some of our experimental therapeutics."

Serum from a surviving patient, or drug treatments that interfere with the virus but have never been tested in people are among the options being considered, Rupp said.

There are no drug treatments on the market for Ebola, and no vaccines to prevent it, though the crisis has accelerated clinical trials to test and bring remedies to the market.

Sacra is the third Christian missionary healthcare worker from the United States to fall ill from Ebola in Africa.

The others, doctor Kent Brantly and aid worker Nancy Writebol, recovered and were released from Emory University Hospital in Atlanta, Georgia last month.

They received an experimental drug called ZMapp, but it is difficult to produce and no more doses are available for now, officials have said.

It remains unclear how Sacra came down with Ebola. He was said to be working in a maternity ward, and was not specifically treating Ebola patients.

SIM USA president Bruce Johnson said the Christian aid group was cooperating with officials from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to find out what exact contact Sacra had with Ebola.

Sacra noticed he had a rising fever on Monday. He isolated himself, and emailed his superiors at SIM USA.

"To all of you at SIM and to my colleagues here in Liberia at ELWA hospital, I apologize," said Johnson, reading portions of Sacra's email message to reporters.

"I know and accept there is no easy solution for an evacuation so I don't expect one. Jesus is right here with me in Liberia," the letter continued.

"I know that with or without evacuation, I could well die of this disease," he added, expressing concern for his wife and sons and for the other healthcare workers and patients on the ground.

Ebola causes fever, vomiting, diarrhea and in severe cases, internal hemorrhaging. The current outbreak has been fatal to about half of those infected.

It is transmissible through close contact with the bodily fluids of an infected person, or by touching the corpse of a person who has recently died of the infection.


http://news.yahoo.com/american-ebola-doctor-sick-stable-175336645.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Nigeria monitoring 400 contacts of doctor who died of Ebola
Reuters
By Stephanie Nebehay  September 4, 2014 8:10 AM



Health workers wearing protective clothing prepare to carry an abandoned dead body presenting with Ebola symptoms at Duwala market in Monrovia August 17, 2014. REUTERS/2Tango



GENEVA (Reuters) - Nigerian authorities are monitoring nearly 400 people for signs of Ebola after they came in contact with a Port Harcourt doctor who died of the disease but hid the fact that he had been exposed, a senior Nigerian health official said on Thursday.

Dr. Abdulsalami Nasidi, project director at Nigeria Centre for Disease Control, said there was a sense of "hopelessness" due to the lack of proven drugs or vaccines to treat Ebola that has infected 18 people in Africa's most populous nation.

In an interview with Reuters in Geneva, he said that more isolation wards were being opened in the oil industry hub but voiced confidence that there would not be "many cases" there.

After having contact with an Ebola patient and before his own death on Aug. 22, the Port Harcourt doctor, named by local authorities as Iyke Enemuo, carried on treating patients and met scores of friends, relatives and medics, leaving about 60 of them at high risk of infection, the World Health Organisation said on Wednesday.

The doctor's wife, who is also a physician, and a patient in the same hospital have been infected with Ebola, the WHO said.

"Everything about this doctor was in secrecy, he violated our public health laws by treating a patient with a highly pathogenic agent who revealed to him that he had contact with Ebola and didn't want to be treated in Lagos because he might be put in isolation," Nasidi said.

"He treated him in secrecy outside hospital premises. When he became ill he did not reveal to his colleagues that he had contact with someone who contracted Ebola. He was taken to General Hospital, a private hospital that sees everybody.

"That is the only case that effectively escaped our surveillance network. We are paying now for it," Nasidi said.

He spoke on the sidelines of a two-day WHO experts meeting aimed at speeding development of Ebola drugs and vaccines.

The deadly virus can be spread by direct contact with body fluids and secretions of an infected person or during traditional burial rituals, the WHO says.

The latest outbreak has spread from Guinea to Liberia, Sierra Leone, Nigeria, and Senegal and, with the death toll at more than 1,900 people as of Wednesday, has killed more people than all outbreaks since Ebola was first uncovered in 1976.

"People are living in a state of hopelessness seeing the disease has no cure and no vaccine but has great potential to spread," Nasidi said.


"380 CONTACTS IN OUR DRAGNET"

Nasidi said the Port Harcourt doctor was visited by friends and family in hospital, including some who "laid hands" on him.

"As we are talking now, we have more than 380 of such contacts in our dragnet," he said. Those at high risk are being quarantined, and some 500 volunteers and health care workers are checking on all exposed people twice a day, he said.

A 28-bed isolation ward for Ebola patients has opened in the city, which is home to many expatriate workers in major international oil companies, but authorities did not forecast many more cases, Nasidi said.

He said most of the exposed contacts were near the end of the 21-incubation period for the disease, which starts with fever and muscle pain, followed by vomiting and diarrhoea.

"So we are monitoring and are sure we shan't miss out on any contacts that come out with infection that could be transmitted. A contact who has no symptoms doesn't transmit even if he has the virus. So this is why we are hopeful," he said.

The United Nations said on Wednesday that $600 million in supplies would be needed to fight West Africa's Ebola outbreak.

"We must fight Ebola because there is huge anxiety for our populations along with significant social and economic consequences," Younoussa Ballo, secretary-general of Guinea's health ministry, told Reuters at Thursday's talks. "Research must be speeded up to have medicines to confront this epidemic."

Human safety trials are due to begin this week on a vaccine from GlaxoSmithKline Plc and later this year on one from NewLink Genetics Corp. Johnson & Johnson said on Thursday that clinical trials of its vaccine would commence in early 2015, accelerated from late 2015 or early 2016.

NewLink founder Charles Link told Reuters in Geneva: "The clinical trials do take some time. Everybody is trying as hard and furiously as possible to move those trials forward as rapidly as possible with the regulations, scientific and ethical constraints.

"Just because we have the drugs we haven't shown anything about their effectiveness so we have to do these initial studies before it would be appropriate to release them on any kind of broader scale," he said.

"So that is really what our group is here for and a number of other groups like ours, is to try to coordinate those activities to do things at speeds that haven't be done before."

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services said this week a federal contract worth up to $42.3 million would help accelerate testing of an experimental Ebola virus treatment being developed by privately held Mapp Biopharmaceutical Inc.


http://news.yahoo.com/nigeria-monitoring-400-contacts-doctor-died-ebola-121048362.html

[Buster's Uncle]

WHO urges use of survivors' serum against Ebola, backs vaccine trials
Reuters
By Stephanie Nebehay and Tom Miles  43 minutes ago



A health worker, right, sprays a man with disinfectant chemicals as he is suspected of dying due to the Ebola virus as people, rear, look on in Monrovia, Liberia, Thursday, Sept. 4, 2014. As West Africa struggles to contain the biggest ever outbreak of Ebola, some experts say an unusual but simple treatment might help: the blood of survivors. The evidence is mixed for using infection-fighting antibodies from survivors' blood for Ebola, but without any licensed drugs or vaccines for the deadly disease, some say it's worth a shot. (AP Photo/Abbas Dulleh)



The World Health Organization (WHO) said on Friday blood-derived products and serum from survivors may be used to treat Ebola virus immediately and two vaccines could be available for health workers by year-end.

Existing supplies of all experimental medicines are limited and will not be sufficient for months to come, while the outlook for vaccine supplies looks "slightly better", the WHO said in a statement after two-day talks attended by nearly 200 experts.

But good clinical care, rigorous infection prevention and control measures, and the tracing of people who have been exposed remain crucial for ending an epidemic that has killed at least 2,097 in West Africa since March, the U.N. agency said.

"There is a real opportunity that blood-derived products can be used now. This can be very effective in terms of treating patients," WHO assistant director-general Marie-Paule Kieny told a news conference in Geneva.

"With the negative point that we have so many patients, one positive point is there are also many people now who are convalescent, who survived and are doing well, These people can provide blood, serum to treat," she told a news conference.

"What is available will be used in the field to treat real patients as soon as possible."

Studies suggest that blood transfusions from Ebola survivors might prevent or treat Ebola virus infection in others, but it is not known whether antibodies in the plasma of survivors are sufficient, according to the United Nations health agency.

Two "promising" Ebola vaccines have also been identified after showing promising results in animals, and safety results from human clinical trials may be available from November, paving the way for their use, Kieny said.



A document is pictured at the opening of a consultation of international experts on potential Ebola therapies and vaccines in Geneva September 4, 2014. On September 4 and 5, the World Health Organization (WHO) brings together 200 key experts to discuss experimental therapies and vaccines with potential to treat or prevent the Ebola virus disease. (REUTERS/Denis Balibouse)


The two vaccines are made by GlaxoSmithKline Plc and NewLink Genetics, according to WHO documents.

"These must be prioritised in terms of clinical development," Kieny said.

Clinical trials of the GSK vaccine have begun in the United States, while trials for the NewLink vaccine will start by mid-September in Europe and Africa, she said.

Pending initial results on the vaccines' safety, expected in November, they will be given to health care workers in the field as a priority, with their informed consent, she said.

"If we have good safety data, if the results are positive, they will start to be used in health care workers in order to protect and also to evaluate if it protects them," Kieny said.

"We will have results of safety by November 2014 and after that these vaccines will start to be rolled out starting with health care workers and front line workers in the field."


ZMAPP DRUG "ENCOURAGING"

ZMapp, made by the U.S.-based Mapp Biopharmaceutical Inc., has been given to seven people infected with Ebola, including two American aid workers and a Briton who all recovered, but it remains unproven and supplies have run out. The U.S. government pledged up to $42.3 million this week to accelerate its testing.

"For the time being there's not enough experience to conclude whether this treatment works or not," Kieny said of the antibody drug ZMapp. "There seem to be encouraging signs."

"As soon as there are supplies available they will be tried."

Dr. Larry Zeitlin, president of the California-based Mapp Biopharmaceutical, told Reuters that Washington's support was vital to conducting early-stage safety studies of the drug as the jury is still out on both its safety and efficacy.

"The U.S. support will enable us to figure out what the appropriate dose is and scale up manufacturing. With a drug you have not only to make it, but make it consistently to the same quality. The award given us is for 18 months. We will probably be in human trials beginning in 2015," Zeitlin said in an interview on Friday on the sidelines of the WHO meeting.

"We don't have data indicating whether ZMapp is safe in humans, we don't have data that it works in humans. That is the whole point of performing clinical trials," he said.

(Reporting by Stephanie Nebehay and Tom Miles; writing by Stephanie Nebehay; editing by Andrew Roche)


http://news.yahoo.com/urges-survivors-serum-against-ebola-backs-vaccine-trials-182618606--finance.html

[Buster's Uncle]

WHO eyes Ebola vaccine by Nov as death toll passes 2,000
AFP
By Nina Larson  16 minutes ago



Geneva (AFP) - The death toll from the Ebola epidemic has climbed above 2,000, the World Health Organisation (WHO) said Friday, as it voiced hopes a vaccine could be available in November.

The deadly virus has claimed 2,097 lives out of 3,944 people infected in Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone, since emerging last December, the UN's health organ said after a two-day crisis meeting in Geneva.

Nigeria has recorded another eight deaths out of 22 cases. At least 30 more people have died in a separate outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Results from safety trials for two prototype vaccines should be known in November, the WHO added.

"If proven safe, a vaccine could be available in November 2014 for priority use in health-care workers," it said in a statement.

Earlier Friday, UN chief Ban Ki-moon set the goal of stopping the worst-ever outbreak of the disease within six to nine months.

The "next few weeks will be crucial," Ban said in New York, adding this was an "international rescue call."

The meeting in Geneva gathered more than 150 experts in drug research, epidemiology, ethics, regulation and financing.


- Promising results -

No licenced vaccine or treatment exist for Ebola, a haemorrhagic fever caused by a virus transmitted through contact with infected body fluids. A number, though, have been tested in animal models and shown promising results.

"In view of the urgency of these outbreaks, the international community is mobilising to find ways to accelerate the evaluation and use of these compounds," the WHO said.

One possible technique is to use blood transfusions from people who have survived Ebola, in the hope that this will boost antibody defences in those who are infected.

"A blood-derived product can be used now, and this can be very effective in terms of treating patients," said WHO assistant director general Marie-Paule Kieny.



A man contaminated with Ebola rests on September 5, 2014 inside the high-risk area at the John Fitzgerald Kennedy hospital of Monrovia, Liberia (AFP Photo/Dominique Faget )


"We agreed that whole blood therapies and convalescent serums may be used to treat Ebola virus disease, and that all efforts must be invested in helping affected countries use them safely."

The two most advanced vaccines -- based on vesicular stomatitis virus and the chimpanzee adenovirus -- will start in Africa and Europe in mid-September, it said.

The agency stressed it would work with all parties to test whether the vaccines are safe, and if so, make them swiftly available.

Supplies of experimental medicines -- including the prototype drug ZMapp -- are limited, and "will not be sufficient for several months to come," the agency warned.

ZMapp has been given to about 10 infected health workers, including Americans and Europeans, of whom three recovered.

Kieny told reporters "there is not enough experience with ZMapp to conclude whether this treatment works or not," adding "there seem to be encouraging signs."



Medical workers wearing Personal Protection Equipment suits carry the body of a victim of the Ebola virus in a bag onto the back of a lorry at the John Fitzgerald Kennedy hospital in Monrovia, on September 5, 2014 (AFP Photo/Dominique Faget )


The European Union released 140 million euros ($187 million) in aid to combat the disease, a day after the United States offered an additional $75 million to buy beds and bolster treatment centres.

The UN's children agency also announced Friday it had used funds from the World Bank to airlift 48 tonnes of medicine and medical supplies, including latex gloves and other protective equipment, intravenous fluids and antibiotics to treat Ebola patients in Sierra Leone.

Ben Neuman, a virologist at the Britain's University of Reading, commented that the WHO's broad strategy was sound.

"It is hard to know which, if any, of the potential Ebola-killing treatments will work best in sick people before they are tested, so it is good that the WHO is considering a wide range of options," he told Britain's Science Media Centre.

"The list of treatments under consideration contains solutions for different problems -- some could stop a person from becoming infected, and others are being considered to treat various stages of infection."


- Medical infrastructure -

The crisis has stirred a fierce debate about how the world should have responded after first reports trickled out from some of the world's poorest countries with dilapidated medical infrastructure.

"Weak health systems mean disaster, mean death," said Nasidi.

In a commentary in The Lancet medical journal published Friday, Georgetown University's Lawrence Gostin blamed "human resource shortages and fragile health systems" for the extent of the outbreak.

"How could this Ebola outbreak have been averted and what could states and the international community do to prevent the next epidemic?" he asked.

"The answer is not untested drugs, mass quarantines, or even humanitarian relief," he wrote, but "to fix these inherent structural deficiencies."


http://news.yahoo.com/ebola-death-toll-soars-past-2-000-165545495.html

[Buster's Uncle]

EU pledges 140 million euros in Ebola aid as West Africa toll tops 2,100
Reuters
By Joe Bavier and Tom Miles  45 minutes ago



ABIDJAN/GENEVA (Reuters) - The European Union on Friday pledged 140 million euros ($180 million) to boost the fight against Ebola in West Africa, where the death toll in the worst outbreak on record has passed 2,100 people.

More than six months into the crisis, the disease is spreading faster than ever and organizations across the world are scrambling cash and supplies to the region. But the World Health Organization (WHO) said the lack of trained staff was hobbling the response.

"The situation is going from bad to worse," said Kristalina Georgieva, the EU commissioner responsible for humanitarian aid. "We are helping make a difference on the ground but the needs are outpacing the international community's capacity to react."

The outbreak was first confirmed in Guinea in March and has since gripped Liberia and Sierra Leone. Cases have also been confirmed in Nigeria to the east and Senegal to the west, where a Guinean student has been isolated.

The EU funding will be used to strengthen health systems, train health workers and pay for mobile testing laboratories, highlighting how the disease has struck some of the continent's poorest nations and exposed the fragility of their medical care.

Over 97 million euros will be spent on budget support to Liberia and Sierra Leone in order to help them deliver public services, including health care, and maintain macroeconomic stability, the European Commission said in a statement.

The WHO last month announced a strategic plan to contain the epidemic over the next nine months, during time which it expects 20,000 people will have contracted the disease.

The United Nations said this week $600 million would be needed to fight the outbreak and an Ebola crisis center would be set up to coordinate the response.

The WHO's plan calls for a force of 12,000 local health workers and 750 foreign experts to be rolled out.

"What is needed really is getting more experts who will be able to train and equip the health workers who will be recruited," said WHO spokesman Tarik Jasarevic in Geneva.

WHO figures showed that 2,105 people had died by Sept. 5, over half of them in Liberia.


NOWHERE TO GO

Ebola is a haemorrhagic fever spread through the blood, sweat or vomit of those infected, making those working directly with the sick among the most vulnerable to the disease.

There is no cure so far, although experimental drugs have been used. The WHO said on Friday experts had agreed that products derived from the blood of survivors could be used to treat the virus, and called for further investment.

According to the WHO, 256 health workers have been infected and 134 have died in this outbreak of Ebola, West Africa's first.

The crisis has crippled the health sectors particularly of Liberia and Sierra Leone, which were short of doctors even before the epidemic struck.

Poor pay and difficult working conditions have prompted health workers to strike in both countries.

The Liberian government has begun offering a $1,000 bonus to healthcare staff who agree to work in Ebola treatment centers.

The WHO has 202 people assigned to tackle Ebola in the affected countries, and the U.S. Center for Disease Control has sent between 60 and 80 experts to Guinea, Sierra Leone or Liberia, according to a U.S. diplomat.

As of Aug. 28, the medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) had 156 foreign staff and about 1,700 local personnel at the forefront of the fight against the epidemic.

The WHO's Jasarevic said the lack of treatment centers was most serious in Liberia, where health officials have been unable to get a true picture of the size of the outbreak.

"This is where we are having the biggest problem, where people simply don't have somewhere to go," he said.

Only about a quarter of Liberian cases are currently being confirmed by a laboratory, he said, with the vast majority listed in WHO statistics as "suspected" or "probable".

At least 31 people have also died of Ebola in Democratic Republic of Congo in an unrelated outbreak. (1 US dollar = 0.7716 euro)

(Additional reporting by Stephanie Nebehay in Geneva; Editing by David Lewis and Daniel Flynn)


http://news.yahoo.com/eu-pledges-140-million-euros-ebola-aid-west-183548647--business.html

[Buster's Uncle]

U.S. missionary with Ebola identified, as survivor shares story
Reuters
By Andrea Lorenz  September 3, 2014 5:57 PM



SIM missionary Nancy Writebol poses for a photo in an undisclosed location in this August 20, 2014 handout provided by SIM USA August 21, 2014. REUTERS/SIM USA/Handout via Reuters



CHARLOTTE N.C. (Reuters) - A third U.S. missionary infected with the Ebola virus in Liberia was identified on Wednesday, even as a fellow aid worker with the same Christian organization publicly shared her battle with the deadly virus for the first time.

Dr. Rick Sacra, a 51-year-old Boston physician, is the latest worker for SIM USA to be infected with Ebola and is receiving care in Liberia, according to the organization.

Sacra had volunteered to return to the country, where he has long offered medical services, when two other U.S. health workers became sickened with the virus during the most severe Ebola outbreak in history.

"I am ready to go," Sacra was quoted as saying by the president of SIM USA, Bruce Johnson, who spoke to reporters at the organization's headquarters in Charlotte.

Sacra had not been caring for Ebola patients but was delivering babies, the group said. It is not known how he contracted the disease.

The doctor was following protocols to prevent the disease, the organization said. It did not immediately provide updates on his condition, but said previously he was doing well.

Since March, more than 3,500 cases of the disease have been reported and more than 1,900 people have died in the West Africa outbreak, the World Health Organization said on Wednesday.

The hemorrhagic fever is only transmitted in humans by contact with the blood or bodily fluids of sick people, although suspected cases of airborne infection have been reported in monkeys in laboratories.


'VERY DARK DAYS'

While fear of infection has hampered international response efforts, it did not deter Nancy Writebol, another U.S. health missionary who contracted the disease in July, also while working at the missionary group's health facilities in Liberia.

"There were some very, very dark days," the 59-year-old mother from Charlotte told reporters, speaking at times through tears. "There were many times when I thought, 'I don’t think I am going to make it anymore.'"

Appearing robust during a news conference at the SIM USA headquarters, Writebol said many factors helped save her life.

She was flown back to the United States to receive care in an isolation unit at Emory University Hospital in Atlanta, where she was treated along with Dr. Kent Brantly, another U.S. missionary who contracted the disease in Liberia.

Writebol and Brantly had worked together in the Ebola unit. They were among the few patients to receive an experimental treatment, ZMapp, although doctors at Emory said they could not determine whether it aided their recovery.

Brantly, affiliated with another missionary group called Samaritan's Purse, also survived the disease, which has an overall fatality rate of about 50 percent in the current outbreak, the WHO said.

"Was it those doctors and nurses that helped to save you, or was it your faith?" said Writebol, citing what many have asked her. "My answer to that question is all of the above."

(Writing by Letitia Stein; Editing by David Adams, Scott Malone and Peter Cooney)


http://news.yahoo.com/u-missionary-describes-dark-days-battling-ebola-154752827.html

[Buster's Uncle]

US doctor infected with Ebola in stable condition
Associated Press
By MARGERY A. BECK  14 minutes ago



OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — A doctor who became infected with Ebola while working in Liberia is sick but in stable condition and communicating with his caregivers at the Nebraska Medical Center, officials said Friday.

Dr. Rick Sacra, 51, is being treated at a 10-bed special isolation unit, the largest of the United States' four. It was built to handle patients with highly infectious and deadly diseases, according to Dr. Mark Rupp, chief of the infectious diseases division at the center.

Sacra— the third American aid worker sickened with the virus — arrived at 6:38 a.m. Friday at the Omaha hospital. Sacra was wheeled on a gurney off the plane at Offutt Air Force Base, transferred to an ambulance and then wheeled into the hospital, said Rosanna Morris, chief nursing officer for the medical center.

Sacra was conscious Friday and was able to communicate with medical staff, Morris said.

The first two American aid workers infected by Ebola — Dr. Kent Brantly and Nancy Writebol — have recovered since being flown to Emory University Hospital in Atlanta for treatment. Sacra came to Omaha instead of Atlanta because federal officials asked the medical center to treat him in order to prepare other isolation units to take more ebola patients if needed.

Sacra, a doctor from Worcester, Massachusetts, who spent 15 years working at the Liberia hospital where he fell ill, said he felt compelled to return after hearing that two other missionaries with the North Carolina-based charity SIM with whom he'd worked were sick. He delivered babies at the hospital, and was not involved in the treatment of Ebola patients, so it's unclear how he became infected with the virus that has killed about 1,900 people.

Dr. Phil Smith, medical director of the Omaha unit, has said a team of 35 doctors, nurses and other medical staffers will provide Sacra with basic care, including ensuring he is hydrated and keeping his vital signs stable.

The team is discussing experimental treatments, including using blood serum from a patient who has recovered from Ebola, Smith said. There are no licensed drugs or vaccines for the disease, but about half a dozen are in development.

Rupp said he's unaware whether Brantley and Writebol have been asked about donating blood serum for Sacra.

"These folks are friendly and know one another, and they would presumably be willing to help their compatriots," Rupp said, adding a battery of tests must first be performed, including one to ensure that any blood serum is compatible with Sacra's blood type.

Doctors with the Omaha hospital have repeatedly said Sacra's transfer to Omaha posed no threat to the public, noting Ebola is transmitted through close contact with an infected person.

SIM president Bruce Johnson said Friday that Sacra's wife, Debbie, is making arrangements to care for their three sons and preparing to fly to Omaha this weekend.

"Rick would actually be somewhat embarrassed by all this attention," Johnson said, adding tearfully that Sacra apologized to SIM officials in an email after he was diagnosed earlier this week. Sacra told them he knew an evacuation would be difficult.

"So I don't expect one," Sacra's email said. "Jesus is right here with me in Liberia."


http://news.yahoo.com/us-doctor-infected-ebola-heading-nebraska-054216448.html