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US Ebola Death: Antivirals Submitted by admin on Wed, 10/08/2014 - 13:19 The first U.S. Ebola patient, Thomas Eric Duncan, has died despite being administered the experimental nucleoside-type antiviral pro-drug Brincidofovir.  How is this possible?  Well , the first problem is that Duncan was not treated until it was far too late for antiviral therapy to work.  Let's take this opportunity to look at some nucleoside antivirals, incuding the drug that was administered to Mr. Duncan in Dallas, TX (Brincidofovir).The first thing to know is remember Brincidofovir and Cidofovir were developed to work against dsDNA Viruses, though Ebola is a...

A scientist funded by the US government has deliberately created an extremely deadly form of mousepox, a relative of the smallpox virus, through genetic engineering. The new virus kills all mice even if they have been given antiviral drugs as well as a vaccine that would normally protect them. The work has not stopped there. The cowpox virus, which infects a range of animals including humans, has been genetically altered in a similar way. The new virus, which is about to be tested on animals, should be lethal only to mice, Mark Buller of the University of St Louis told...