Posted on 09/06/2014 2:13:53 PM PDT by BenLurkin
... part of the population in West Africa is immune to the Ebola virus, according to virologists who specialize in the disease.
Assuming they are correct, and if those people can be identified... Immune persons could safely tend the sick and bury the dead just as smallpox survivors did in the centuries before smallpox vaccine.
...antibodies could be harvested from their blood to treat new Ebola victims.
But many factors remain unclear, including which Africans have antibodies and how much antibody is needed to be protective....
“It's fair to say that some people are immune,” said Robert F. Garry Jr., a Tulane University expert in hemorrhagic fevers who works in Sierra Leone. “But we don't know if it's 1 percent or 2 percent or 20 percent.”
Right now, there are about 1,800 survivors of the current West African outbreak, all of whom are now immune, of course. But there may be many thousands more.
Small studies of household contacts of Ebola victims show that some people are infected without ever falling ill — perhaps because of some unknown genetic advantage.
But many Africans who have never seen a victim also have antibodies.
It is possible that some get low doses of virus by eating infected monkeys or bats that are undercooked.
“If someone got just two or three or four virus particles, if it enters through the mucus membranes in the mouth, yes, it's plausible,” said Thomas W. Geisbert, a hemorrhagic fever expert at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston. "... The immune system gets a chance to fight it off.”
...
One of France's leading Ebola experts says he believes that many rural villagers are “vaccinated” by eating fruit gnawed on by bats and contaminated with their saliva.
(Excerpt) Read more at telegram.com ...
2014-09-05 22:28
Geneva - More than 2,000 people have died in the Ebola outbreak in West Africa, the World Health Organisation said on Friday, out of about 4,000 patients thought to have been infected in the three countries worst hit by the disease.
The death toll in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone totaled 2,097 as at 5 Sept, out of 3,944 cases, a WHO document said.
1800 survivors, 2097 dead, would mean only 47 active cases. Perhaps now you will understand why I asked.
Only 47 active cases? I doubt that is the situation.
might not have even known they were sick with it
they might have had a poop bag on him..
I’d have to look at the exact numbers. The last set of numbers I saw were from the 31st.
Active cases would only include cases from the last 2 or 3 weeks. Any cases from before that time are resolved.
You’re Welcome, Alamo-Girl!
I was also curious if it could mutate enough that even people who fought it off the first time would have to do it again after it evolved a while, even if it was the same base strain they were exposed to earlier.
Great, ...so the human race can only look forwards to a future similar to that foretold in the movie “IDIOCRACY”, where ‘Da MAN’ dies out, and the eubonics bred, Michael Browns of the world, remain alive.
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