New Treatment Found for Ebola Fever

October 29, 2013

Medical worker tests for the Ebola virus.

From VOA Learning English, this is Science in the News. I’m Bob Doughty.

And I’m Faith Lapidus. Today we tell about Ebola hemorrhagic fever and a promising treatment for the disease. We also have a report about tuberculosis bacteria. Scientists now say human tuberculosis was present in Africa tens of thousands of years ago. We also tell about progress against a disease that threatens 20 percent of the world’s population.

Medical researchers have developed a promising treatment for Ebola hemorrhagic fever. The experimental compound could become the first successful treatment for Ebola. It helped even after signs of the disease developed.

Ebola hemorrhagic fever is spread by infected bats in western Africa. Right now, some forms of the virus kill about 90 percent of the people they infect. That is because by the time people show Ebola symptoms, little can be done to save them. The signs include high body temperature, breathing problems, and severe pain in the head or other body parts.

American scientists have developed an experimental treatment that could save lives. The researchers work with the Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases. Researcher James Pettitt says more than 40 percent of rhesus macaques were cured after they had already developed severe symptoms. The animals were treated with protective antibodies taken from specially grown tobacco plants. The treatment is called MB-003.