Drug blocks Ebola-like virus in monkey tests
2014-08-21 11:46
Lagos - An experimental drug treatment can help monkeys survive an otherwise deadly
infection with a tropical virus called Marburg, which is similar to Ebola, researchers said
Wednesday.
An experimental drug treatment can help monkeys survive an otherwise deadly infection
with a tropical virus called Marburg, which is similar to Ebola, researchers said
Wednesday.
The findings in the journal Science Translational Medicine show the potential for a similar
drug treatment against Ebola, the deadly haemorrhagic virus that is sweeping across West
Africa in the largest outbreak to date.
There is no available drug or vaccine for Ebola, which has killed 1,350 people and infected
2,473 since March in Sierra Leone, Nigeria, Guinea and Liberia.
Marburg is from the same family as the Ebola virus and also causes severe bleeding, fever,
vomiting and diarrhoea.
Fatality rates range from 25 percent to 80 percent, and like Ebola, it is transmitted via
contact with bodily fluids.
How the study was conducted
The study tested a Marburg virus drug, made by Canada's Tekmira Pharmaceuticals, on 16
monkeys.
One group was given the treatment 30-45 minutes after exposure to a lethal dose of the
Angola strain of Marburg virus. Other groups were treated one, two and three days
following the infection.
"All treated animals in all four studies survived," said lead author Thomas Geisbert,
professor of microbiology and immunology at the University of Texas Medical Branch at
Galveston.
The control group included monkeys that were sickened with Marburg virus but were not
given the treatment. They all died, beginning one week after they were infected.
The discovery that the treatment worked even three days into the monkeys' infections
shows "real world utility of this technology," Geisbert told reporters.
Researchers are hopeful that such a treatment could be useful because symptoms of
Marburg virus begin showing themselves around that time.
Ebola, too, usually becomes symptomatic within two to 10 days of infection, though the
incubation period can last as long as 21 days.
The researchers published a study in The Lancet in 2010 that showed the same technology
could be used to create a treatment that would completely protect rhesus monkeys against
Ebola.
"This technology may have potential for combating Ebola," Geisbert said.
For it to be deployed for "compassionate use during this outbreak" in people, there would
have to be "a situation where a country or someone would request that from the
company," he told reporters.
He added that there were "no problems" in terms of side effects with the doses given in
the monkey tests.
Tekmira has begun phase one trials to test safety in people, and in March the company
said it was granted a Fast-Track designation by the US Food and Drug Administration to
develop its drug, TKM-Ebola.
The drug works by interfering with how Ebola grows once it penetrates the cells of the
body.
Other experimental treatments
Another experimental Ebola drug, ZMapp, works differently, by delivering the body a
cocktail of antibodies that target different parts of the Ebola virus.
ZMapp has been given to a handful of people who were sickened in the latest outbreak,
including to American missionaries, but it is difficult to make in large amounts.
Geisbert said the Tekmira product could be replicated "relatively quickly," given the proper
funding.
Experts say that getting enough money to pay for trials and development has been a key
challenge for drug makers, due the history of sporadic outbreaks in Africa.
l
-News24

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