Fresh hope appears in the horizon for Ebola
patients as Japan on Monday expressed its
readiness to provide its anti-influenza drug as
treatment for the deadly virus.
Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary, Yoshihide Suga,
made the offer hours after a group of scientist in
the United Kingdom said it had discovered that
the largest outbreak of the Ebola Virus Disease
was caused by an infected fruit bat that bit a
toddler.
Briefing journalists in Tokyo on Monday, Suga
said Japan was ready to offer the drug,
Favipiravir, which was developed by Toyama
Chemical, a subsidiary of Fujifilm, any time the
World Health Organisation requested it.
Approved by the Japanese health ministry in
March, Favipiravir is a tablet developed for the
treatment of novel and re-emerging influenza
viruses.
Suga, according to the Agence France Presse,
said Japan was waiting for WHO’s decision on
further details over the use of untested drugs.
He however said that “in case of an emergency,
Japan may respond to individual requests before
any further decision by the WHO.”
The spokesperson for the company, Takao Aoki,
said Fujifilm had initiated talks with the United
States on how the drug could be adopted in
treating EVD.
He said, “Fujifilm is in talks with the US Food
and Drug Administration on clinical testing of the
drug in treating Ebola, The company has
Favipiravir stock for more than 20,000 patients.
Ebola and influenza viruses are the same type
and theoretically similar effects can be expected
on Ebola,” he said.
It was however not known as of Thursday last
week if Favipiravir is the drug the Federal
Ministry of Health had said it had requested from
a foreign country.
The ministry which turned down a trial drug,
Nano Silver, had applied for ZMapp which was
administered on two US aid workers who
contracted the virus in Liberia.
The two were discharged last Thursday, a few
days after Washington said it did not have
enough XMapp to send to countries in need of it.
ZMapp fails Liberian doctor
However, a Liberian doctor , Abraham Borbor,
has died despite taking ZMapp, according to a
statement by the Liberia’s information minister,
Lewis Brown.
Borbor was one of three doctors in Liberia who
had been given ZMapp and was showing signs
of recovery.
“Borbor was showing signs of improvement but
on Sunday, he took a turn for the worse,”
Brown told the British Broadcasting Corporation.
Meanwhile, the Federal Government on Monday
reversed the number of confirmed EVD cases in
Nigeria from 14 to 13.
Health Minister, Prof Onyebuchi Chukwu, said
while briefing journalists in Abuja that the
development followed the outcome of a further
confirmation test conducted on the 14th case,
which turned out to be negative.
He also said another patient in the isolation
centre in Lagos had after receiving treatment
tested negative.
The patient, according to him, will be dicharged
before Wednesday.
He said the development would bring from four
to two, the number of patients still in the
isolation ward.
The minister added that the number of deaths
recorded so far in the country as a result of the
disease still remained five, including the Late
Patrick Sawyer, who brought the EVD to Nigeria
from Liberia.
Chukwu said, “We have been able to manage
and discharge five persons who had tested
positive to the deadly virus, while the sixth
person would be dicharged within the next 48
hours.
“For each case that tested negative, we run
further confirmatory tests to make sure that
anybody that is labelled as EVD victim, is truly
having the disease.
“The 14th case has turned out to be negative in
terms of anaemia and symptoms, so that has
now reversed number of EVD cases in Nigeria
from 14 to 13 and that includes the index case
(Sawyer).
“As of today (Monday), we have three patients
receiving treatment in the isolation ward in
Lagos but certainly, before Wednesday, one of
them would be discharged because he has
tested negative and we are now concluding his
discharge process.”
The ministry also denied reports ( The PUNCH
not included) which claimed that the younger
sister of the late Dr. Stella Adadevoh, had tested
positive to the EVD.
The minister’s Special Adviser on Media and
Communications, Dan Nwomeh, said on Monday
that no new patient had been admitted into the
treatment centre in Lagos.
He said, “We are not aware of that development,
but to avoid any confusion, Minister of Health
reiterates that he has the sole authority to
announce confirmed and discharged EVD cases.
“Any doubtful information on the outbreak of EVD
should be verified from the office of the minister ,
we are on all social media platforms.”
A group of 17 UK-based European and African
scientists have found out that the largest
outbreak of the EVD was caused by an infected
fruit bats that bit a toddler.
The tropical disease researchers, ecologists and
anthropologists had spent three weeks
investigating the outbreak of the disease in
Nigeria, Guinea, Liberia and Ivory Coast.
According to the Daily Mail, the scientists
captured some bats and other creatures near the
village of Meliandoua in Guinea, where the
present epidemic began last year in December.
According to the scientists, the toddler, who
was bitten by a fruit bat passed the infection
on to his mother and both died within a week.
The disease was then spread far and wide by
mourners who attended their funeral.
Scientists have long believed that bats are the
main carriers for the disease but it is rare for
them to pass it on to man.
Most of the previous outbreaks have been
caused by meat from dead infected animals
collected by hunters who then sell it on.
Fruit bats, however, are widely eaten in some
rural areas of West Africa – either smoked,
grilled or in a spicy soup.
The team led by epidemiologist Fabian
Leendertz, a disease ecologist at the Robert Koch
Institute in Berlin, are expected to publish their
results in a major journal soon.
Initial research believed that a new strain of
Ebola had emerged in West Africa but according
to Herr Leendertz, the strain of the disease is
one related to Zaire ebolavirus, identified more
than 10 years ago in the Congo.