Blood of Ebola survivors can be a cure to the deadly disease. The proteins found in the survivor of this disease may help others to cure.
Rick Sacra, a survivor of Ebola, who got infected in Liberia but got well after the treatment in US, is a physician at the University of Massachusetts, have agreed to donate her blood to research aimed to develop new medicines.
By virtue of this donation, James Crowe of Vanderbilt University has found what he was looking for months and can now hopefully develop a new class of drugs.
Sacra said “They can take antibodies they find in my blood and map them out. They are looking for the ones that are most important in neutralizing the virus,”
The disease has already taken 7000 lives in West Africa which is the most deadly outbreak ever.
Rick Sacra is a missionary for Christian group SIM USA. He will be going back to Liberia on January 15, 2015 but will not be fighting the epidemic. She will be treating patients with high B.P and diabetes.
“This demonstrates how Rick has such a heart for serving others and using his skills to treat those suffering from various conditions. We’re so thankful for his successful treatment and recovery from Ebola. He has spent nearly 20 years serving patients in Liberia, and now he’s ready to get back to work doing the things he’s trained and gifted to perform,” Bruce Johnson, president of SIM USA, said.
Mapp Biopharmaceutical, an American pharmaceutical company based in San Diego, California, is developing a drug treatment called ZMapp, which is a compound of three antibodies which have each been shown to be effective in treating Ebola infections. The research is been funded by National Institutes of Health (NIH). By studying the antibody from Sacra’s blood the Crowe and Mapp are hopeful to shape ZMapp so that it can target the Ebloa strains. Success in this would lead the drugs to a whole another level.
Antibodies from the special cells called WBCs or B cells are going to be examined in development of new drug. ZMapp uses the antibodies from tobacco plant while researchers are planning to use mammal cells in future development.
