Ebola Researcher in Germany Is Isolated After Needle Puncture

March 17 (Bloomberg) -- A researcher at a Hamburg laboratory was punctured with a needle that may have contained traces of the deadly Ebola virus and was transferred to an isolation ward following inoculation treatment, the clinic said in a statement.

The university clinic in Hamburg-Eppendorf, which is treating the woman, ruled out any danger to the public, according to the e-mailed statement. Ebola is an animal-borne virus that causes high fever, diarrhea, vomiting and internal bleeding.

The woman, a scientist at the Bernhard-Nocht-Institut for tropical medicine, was punctured through protective clothing while in a high-security laboratory on March 12. Though she showed no signs of infection, a group of experts recommended an inoculation treatment developed in the U.S., the clinic said.

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First person to receive vaccine The vaccine arrived in Germany last Friday and was given to the woman the next day, making her the first person to receive this vaccine. The scientist who led the development team praised Canada's quick response.

"It was a tremendous response on the Winnipeg side to get that out the same day and get it over and get this delivered," said Dr. Heinz Feldmann, former head of the special pathogens unit at the Winnipeg lab.

"She got immunized within 40 hours after exposure. And considering that this had to be shipped across the Atlantic, I think that's quite an achievement."

Canadian Vaccine

Great news that they may have a vaccine for Ebola. I hope it is effective and the researcher is not affected.

Africa has periodic deadly Ebola outbreaks, so a lot of lives can be saved. Nice find

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/files/ef5a80454f43094d.jpg[/atsimg]

Call it the cost of doing business, I guess. I applaud Canada's quick reaction time, and even though she is the first human to get this antidote, I hope it helps her get better.

She pricked her finger, an easy enough mistake. Its hard to progress without studying these things, and before you say they shouldn't have, just remember it took a lot of studying for the Canadians to come up with some type of antidote.

Trial by fire!

reply to post by drsmooth23


I suppose Wacko Jacko's death has more relevance than the potential Ebola cure being tested.

Here is more info on the vaccine:

An experimental Ebola vaccine developed in Winnipeg could eventually become the first treatment for people newly infected with the deadly virus. Testing in three types of animals showed the vaccine kept at least half from dying when it was administered after infection, Canadian and American researchers reported in the Jan. 19 issue of the journal Public Library of Science Pathogens. The vaccine aims to tip the balance in favour of the immune system over the virus, said Dr. Steven Jones. (CBC) Most promising was the fact that four of eight primates injected with a lethal dose of Ebola virus survived when they were given the vaccine within 30 minutes of exposure. It is the first time a vaccine against one of the species of Ebola viruses has been shown to be effective in what's called a post-exposure setting. In fact, it's the first time anything has been shown to improve survival after infection with an Ebola virus.

Link

Very encouraging indeed.

From the same article, a bit of oddness. The scientist who named the Ebola virus was resigned to the fact that unless there was a lab accident, this vaccine could never be ethically tested!

"I don't think this takes us any closer to actually having something," said Dr. Karl Johnson, who headed the special pathogens unit at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control when Ebola first came to the attention of developed countries. Johnson said it would be unacceptable to use the vaccine in Africa — where Ebola outbreaks occur — until it's been shown to be safe and effective elsewhere. Thankfully, lab accidents with filoviruses are exceedingly rare because of the high levels of training and of biosafety required to work with these most horrific of viral killers. It could be years before there was even an opportunity to test the vaccine in a lab accident victim.

Now that is interesting.

edit: the article is 2 years old, so Dr Johnson was correct in his assumption.

[edit on 30/6/2009 by deltaalphanovember]

Originally posted by deltaalphanovember
From the same article, a bit of oddness. The scientist who named the Ebola virus was resigned to the fact that unless there was a lab accident, this vaccine could never be ethically tested!

Thankfully, lab accidents with filoviruses are exceedingly rare because of the high levels of training and of biosafety required to work with these most horrific of viral killers. It could be years before there was even an opportunity to test the vaccine in a lab accident victim.

Thats a very good point. I wonder how many other vaccines there are which cant be tested until it is almost too late for the victim. I have a hard time getting mail from the other side of town in less than two days, its great they could get the experimental vaccine from Canada in such a small window of time, Less than 40 hours.

It will be quite the test to see if this post exposure treatment arrests the negative effects of the virus.

Originally posted by deltaalphanovember
reply to post by drsmooth23

 

I suppose Wacko Jacko's death has more relevance than the potential Ebola cure being tested.

I know right!! were are on the verge of a break through but I guess that doesnt matter to most cats here.

If yall dont want to post I think we should at least Pray or send positive vibes her way so we can finally conquer this virus.

Yeah..... wasn't there a research scientist in Winnipeg who, a few weeks ago, made off with a few vials of Ebola?

He was charged with something like not declaring an item over international borders......

Could Winnipeg's Level 4 lab have produced either a vaccine or an immunoglobulin anti-Ebola serum?

Just "in time" it would seem.

I smell fish................

reply to post by drsmooth23


Its because Ebola is not a world wide killer because of the way its spread and because the people that get it die so quickly, they have no time to spread it around. Besides, the majority of the cases are usually isolated to African villages and cities and we all know that nobody cares about what goes on in Africa.
A major ebola outbreak usually consists of less than one hundred people dying.
Now if ebola ever mutates and becomes airborne,, then we could be in trouble.

reply to post by Kr0n0s


There is some evidence that Ebola can, and has become airborne - although apparently it loses it's lethality to humans.

Is Ebola transmitted via the air? In primates the Ebola virus was transmitted through the air in a research facility in Reston, Virginia. Apparently the mutations that allowed the virus to easily transmit via the air also changed its effect on humans. Tests showed that four lab workers tested positive for Ebola Reston virus, but this strain of the virus caused only minor health problems (although all the monkeys in the Reston facility were destroyed to prevent the outbreak from spreading).

Link

So, I don't think we should ever become too complacent - the chances of a deadly strain of airborne Ebola are not that remote after all.

here are claims, however, that airborne human to human transmission of Ebola occurred in 1976. Reports say that Mayinga N'Seka (seen as the patient in the image to the right), a nurse in Zaire may have contracted the virus via the air. Evidence is thin, and even if it was true, Nurse Mayinga did not infect any other humans before she died.

reply to post by deltaalphanovember


The virus tends to have such a high and swift mortality rate that it actually makes it not that deadly, strangely enough since the people die before transmission. Compared to other diseases in Africa, the number of lives lost to ebola is very very low.

reply to post by ghaleon12


I agree that Ebola and Marborg kill their victims very quickly therefore the death tolls are never extremely high as they tend to break out in isolated villages with relatively low populations.

However, imagine the death toll if Ebola had to hit a city like New York or LA. Imagine if the airborne strain becomes just as lethal as the non-airborne strain.

This is not science fiction or fear mongering ... read the article in the link I posted above.

The reason I flagged this thread was simply that if the worst scenario came about, there is hope through the dedicated research of the Ebola scientists as highlighted by the OP. You cannot just say ... we are safe because it only affects isolated villages in Africa.

So i guess Now my major question is this;

Why hasnt the vaccine been tested in Africa where people see this all the time? Why did it take a lab malfunction to give this a proper test?!?

[edit on 2-7-2009 by drsmooth23]

reply to post by drsmooth23


According to the scientist in the article I linked to, the problem is ethics. They rightfully don't want to use humans as guinea pigs. Especially ones from the 3rd World. There is a bit of a stigma attached to it these days after the bad press a few of the big corporations got (a lot of people died).

Basically someone has to volunteer (in the case of Ebola - not exactly a winning proposition), or they have to wait till there is an accident, as in this case.

Wow- Glad the world has been notified that there is an Ebola vaccine....from Canada? didn't someone just slip out of Winnipeg's Level 4 lab with Ebola samples?

Interesting that all of a sudden, there's a !!!vaccine!!!! for a virus that has been researched for 30+ years, without hope of a vaccine.

I wonder if the developed nations will be magnanimous and share it with the Africans who have outbreaks and die of it all the time.......

Or- maybe it's a weaponized strain and the vaccine was made with the strain- in which case it wouldn't help the Zairois (DNC) folks very much.

Unbelievable.

reply to post by CultureD


And to make things even more confusing, there are 4 subtypes of the Ebola virus:

Presently, 4 distinct subtypes have been identified, each named for the location where it caused documented human or animal disease. Two Africa subtypes, Ebola virus Zaire (EBO-Z) and Ebola virus Sudan (EBO-S), have been responsible for most of the reported deaths caused by filoviruses. Clinical disease due to African-derived Ebola virus is severe and, with the exception of 2 patients infected with the Ebola virus Côte-d'Ivoire (EBO-C) subtype who survived, is associated with a mortality rate of 65% (Sudan, 1979) to 89% (DRC, Dec 2002 to Apr 2003). The fourth subtype is Ebola virus Reston (EBO-R), which was first isolated in 1989 in monkeys imported from a single Philippine exporter. A virtually identical isolate imported from the same Philippine exporter was detected in 1992 in Siena, Italy.

Link

Oh yeah- Ebola is a slick little bug. That's why I was aghast at a vaccine. How in heck did that happen?

Thanks for the info- will dig, myself on this one- people have GOT to stop playing with fire, for the love of god. We're going to unleash every bloody microbe around, and then screw up pulblic health measures via politics- could go on, but won't sleep

Cheers and be well