*Why did the white people get the medicine while all those black people were dying?*
1. Three vials of serum were sent. We haven’t been told who the recipient of the third vial is.
2.Medical staff would be considered hyperinformed of the risks of an experimental treatment and so the medical ethics issue is sidestepped with those volunteers.
3. It was Samaritan who ferretted out MAPP - and - who agreed to hold MAPP legally harmless in exchange for access to the treatment, so legal issues were also sidestepped.
4. When giving an untested-in-humans treatment to a foreign national in a foreign country without that country’s explicit approval or guarantee not to hold anyone involved in distribution legally liable, there may be legal issues as well as ethical issues preventing distribution.
5. There isn’t a vat of zMAPP sitting around and nobody knew whether it would work or not.
however, the reporter may be happy to learn that :
“The World Health Organisation (WHO) said it would ask medical ethics experts to explore emergency use of experimental treatments...”
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/08/07/us-health-ebola-idUSKBN0G61ID20140807
Those doctors and nurses etc. put their lives on the line to go and help the victims of ebola. They did not have to do this but volunteered to do this.
They should be first to get an experimental cure for the disease. They earned it and their color is irrelevant.
zMAPP seemed very effective, at least in the short term. Other drugs are being researched as well. A Canadian company, Tekmira, is working with the FDA right now.