Ebola Virus Disease is a deadly disease that has no cure or vaccine yet. Supportive treatment was the only resort and option patients with the disease have. This controversial treatment is the only hope in the middle of chaos and hopelessness in West Africa, and now for a young nurse who selflessly took care of an Ebola patient two weeks ago in the Dallas Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital. Transfusing a unit of blood from an Ebola virus survivor to the patient might actually work, researchers say.
Nina Pham was among the 70 health care workers who took care of Thomas Eric Duncan, the first person in the United States to have Ebola Virus. Duncan died on October 2, 2014 succumbing to the virus' effects on his body. Now, she will undergo an experimental treatment where blood from an Ebola survivor will be transfused to her in order to recover.
Dr. Kent Brantly, a doctor who came from Liberia and contracted the disease, survived the hurdle because he received blood from a 14-year old boy who was saved from the disease with the help of Dr. Brantly. Now, the doctor thinks it is his time to pass it on.
However, the World Health Organization is not in favor of this treatment method. It sanctioned this method because it has not been proven true yet. Furthermore, no regulatory body has issued and implemented guidelines yet. Health researchers are clamouring to find the cure for this disease but all are yet in the experimental stage of their studies and every day, many lives are taken.
The mechanism behind this treatment is that when someone who recovered from Ebola gives his blood to a new patient, they will recover. This is because the blood has antibodies for the said virus. The scientist who discovered the virus Ebola in 1976, Peter Piot from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine said that they only had one possible treatment option before, that's in the form of serum from convalescents who had very high levels of antibodies. They tested it on a researcher in Britain who contracted the virus and he got better.
The Ebola virus took over 4,000 patients and infection more than 8,000 in West Africa. Measures are being taken by many organizations and governments around the globe to put a stop on this life-threatening outbreak.