Liberia: President Obama Approves the Use of Experimental Drug on Two Liberian Doctors undergoing Treatment for Ebola

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The White House and the United States Food and Drug Administration have approved the request for sample doses of experimental Serum to treat Liberian doctors who are currently infected with the deadly Ebola virus disease.
According an Executive Mansion release, the approval was in response to an August 8, 2014 communication sent to President Barrack Obama by President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf in which she requested the experimental Serum to be used on the affected Liberian doctors.
The experimental drugs are to be brought in the country by a representative of the U.S. Government later this week.
Meanwhile, the Executive Director of the World Health Organization, Dr. Margaret Chan, has authorized the dispatch of additional doses of the experimental Serum to Liberia to support the treatment of affected doctors. The experimental Serum from the WHO will be brought in by one of its experts later this week.:tiphat:http://allafrica.com/stories/201408113458.html

 

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Re: Liberia: President Obama Approves the Use of Experimental Drug on Two Liberian Doctors undergoing Treatment for Ebola

Ebola Drug Supply Is Exhausted After Doses Sent to Africa

By Caroline Chen and Robert Langreth
Aug 11, 2014 5:10 PM ET
The Ebola drug given to two Americans and a Spanish priest has been sent to a West African country that requested it, and the supply of the medicine is now exhausted, its manufacturer said.
Mapp Biopharmaceutical Inc., based in San Diego, said it was told by U.S. health officials that the countries, including Nigeria and Liberia, had requested the drug, called ZMapp. The company said it has complied with every request for the drug that was authorized by legal and regulatory authorities. It said it provided the drug at no cost.
?It is our understanding that all patients offered treatment, treated, or expected to be treated were or are highly capable of providing informed consent for the use of an experimental drug not yet evaluated for safety in animals or people,? the company said in a statement.
The additional patients allocated the drug include medical doctors in two West African countries as well as the Americans and the Spanish priest.
The decision comes as a panel of ethicists convened today by the World Health Organization weighs the use of experimental drugs that have shown early promise against a disease that?s killed almost 1,000 people this year. The panel is considering whether the drugs, which haven?t been widely tested for safety, should be used in an outbreak where 40 percent of infected people survive and, if so, who should get them from what may be a limited supply.
?First Effort?

?This is the first effort to have a long-overdue, transparent, public discussion about how to distribute life-saving medicines in an emergency,? said Arthur Caplan, director of the division of medical ethics at NYU Langone Medical Center, in a tel....:tiphat:http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-...-is-exhausted-after-doses-sent-to-africa.html