Ebola Virus 2014: Symptoms And Reasons Why Researchers are Having a Difficult Time Finding Cure
Over the past month, researchers worldwide have frantically struggled towards finding an effective treatment or cure to the 2014 Ebola outbreak, as bodies continue to line the streets of countries in Africa's western provinces. Known as "Hemorrhagic Fever" for the final stages of the viral infection, Ebola has proven to be a complex pathogen, with an extremely lethal prognosis of 90% incidence of fatality after transmission. And as researchers turn to contemporary methods of viral treatment, they are finding that the complexities of this virus' infection plan may just be as deadly as HIV.
Thought to have been originally transmitted by consumption of African monkeys, a widely eaten delicacy known as bushmeat, Ebola carries similar origins to the global killer HIV and even worse symptoms. Transmittable by blood or mucosal secretions, Ebola has spread in the unsanitary conditions of West Africa, and researchers fear that given time the virus may evolve the ability to be transmitted through the air.
Once infected, the symptomatic stages of Ebola appear swiftly and escalate from simple influenza-like symptoms to hemorrhagic death. The hemorrhagic, bleeding stage, of Ebola typically begins 5 to 7 days after infection, and presents itself in vomiting blood and subcutaneous bleeding, underneath the skin and into organs like the eyes.
As a filovirus, from the family Filoviridae, Ebola is far quicker to cause death than retroviruses like HIV because of the fact that it does not need to wait for the host immune system to be compromised. The virus targets specific cells within the host, such as monocytes and endothelial cells of blood vessels, and once bound to protein receptors, the virus is able to use the host's cells as a manufacturing headquarters for spread of the disease. Utilizing its genetic coding as mRNA within the human cell, the virus is able to drive protein synthesis which is essential for the hemorrhagic stages of the disease.
Looking to block the lethal stages of Ebola, allowing for those infected to simply fight off influenza-like symptoms rather than hemorrhaging to death, researchers are looking for means of inhibiting the virus' binding to cellular membranes and production of proteins. However, as a difficult and not well-understood pathway, inoculations and cures for Ebola have not yet been successful in human test subjects.
Promising DNA vaccines derived from adenoviruses have proven effective in nonhuman primates used in pre-clinical trials, however, are not an effective treatment in the current crisis, as the vaccine requires roughly two months for the infected host to acquire immunity by synthesizing their own antibodies. As more immediate methods of treatment, researchers are looking towards vaccinations used for similar viral pathogens, and news from Japanese health officials insists that medications like experimental anti-flu drugs or even Tamiflu may in fact cure symptoms, as influenza strains act similar to the filovirus.
News this morning came from Canadian pharmaceutical company Immunovaccine Inc. saying that the Nova Scotia-based company has in fact had successful trials of a new vaccine to combat Ebola. But although four monkeys survived the tests administered by the US Health Department's National Institute of Health, Immunovaccine Inc. and researchers are still unsure if the vaccine will remain efficient or valid in human patients.
Although researchers worldwide are searching for a similar cure, the diversity in approaches and interpretations of how to combat the filovirus Ebola will hopefully lead to an efficient cure before further casualties fall to the illness spreading throughout the globe.