Month: August 2014

By Ben Hirschler LONDON (Reuters) – World Health Organization experts fighting the world’s worst outbreak of Ebola hope for improved supplies of experimental treatments and progress with a vaccine by the end of the year. After ruling on Tuesday that it is ethical to offer unproven Ebola drugs to people infected or at risk in West Africa, the challenge is to secure enough doses to make a difference in an outbreak that has already claimed more than 1,000 lives. An experimental drug called ZMapp from U.S. firm Mapp Biopharmaceutical appears to have had “a dramatic and very rapid effect” in the case of two U.S. doctors, WHO assistant director-general Marie-Paule Kieny told reporters. One of the deadliest diseases known to man, Ebola kills the vast majority of those infected.

Robin Williams’ apparent suicide has put a spotlight on the dark side of comedy. Williams, like many comedians, lived with long-term depression and addiction.

The World Health Organization authorised Tuesday the use of experimental drugs to fight Ebola as the death toll topped 1,000 and a Spanish priest became the first European to succumb to the latest outbreak. The declaration by the UN's health agency came after a US company that makes an experimental serum called ZMapp said it had sent all its available supplies to hard-hit west Africa. "In the special circumstances of this Ebola outbreak it is ethical to offer unregistered interventions as potential treatments or prevention," WHO assistant director general Marie-Paule Kieny told reporters in Geneva, following a meeting of medical experts on the issue. The epidemic, described as the worst since Ebola was first discovered four decades ago, has killed 1,013 people since early this year, the WHO said.

By Kate Kelland and Stephanie Nebehay LONDON/GENEVA (Reuters) – People infected in the West Africa Ebola outbreak can be offered untested drugs, the World Health Organization said on Tuesday, but scarce supplies raise questions about who gets priority in the epidemic of the virus, which has no proven treatment. Liberia said it planned to treat two infected doctors with an unproven Ebola medicine called ZMapp, the first Africans to receive the drug, while a Spanish priest, who the Health Ministry in Madrid said had also been given ZMapp, died. The West Africa Ebola virus epidemic – the world's largest and deadliest so far – has killed at least 1,013 people in Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Nigeria. There are no licensed treatments or vaccines for Ebola, but several biotech companies and research teams have been working on potential drugs.

Robin Williams’ apparent suicide has put a spotlight on the dark side of comedy. Williams, like many comedians, lived with long-term depression and addiction.