An oral treatment that avoids the death of primates infected with the Ebola virus and helps them develop antibodies is arousing interest in humans.
A pill against Ebola: a more concrete step towards what for now resembles a mirage comes from a small study carried out on the monkeys. An antiviral to be taken by mouth He avoided death in a dozen infected primates with a very lethal form of ebola viruses. The discovery, published on Science Advancescould open the way to faster, effective and immediately available treatments In the epidemics of this hemorrhagic fever.
Stop replication. The drug is theObeldesiviran antiviral similar to the RemDesivir that had been used against Covid-19, but which unlike that is administered orally and not through intravenous infusions. A more practical way that theoretically would allow more infected people to take the medicine and save their lives. The drug is a polymerase inhibitor: in practice it blocks a crucial enzyme for viral replication.
A medicinal core weapon. The epidemics of some ebola virus strains reach a lethality of 90%. A vaccine approved for adults in 2019 are currently available against the disease, which halves mortality and of which in extreme cases the administration of contagion already occurred is also attempted; And Two treatments based on monoclonal antibodiesvery expensive and to be taken intravenously.
These solutions require the conservation of drugs in refrigerators and can be difficult to provide in remote areas, without any type of health facility. That’s why the possibility of an effective ebola pill would represent a substantial advantage.
The experiment. Thomas Geisbert, virologist of the University of Texas of Galveston, together with colleagues infected Macachi Rhesus (Macaca Mulatta) and Cinomolghi (Macaca Fascicularis) with very high doses of Ebola virus makonaa variant of the potentially lethal zaire ebolavirus species, known for having caused the ebola epidemic in western Africa of 2014. After a day from the exhibition, ten monkeys received A daily dose of obeldesivir for ten days; Three more nothing, and they died.
Unharmed and protected. The pill antiviral protected 80% of Cinomolghi and 100% of the rhesus macaques, genetically more similar to humans. The medicine cleaned the blood of the animals from the traces of viruses and induced an immune reaction that helped them to develop antibodies and to avoid the multi -organ damage typical of the ebola infection.
Even if the number of monkeys treated is very low, Geisbert states that the effect found is statistically relevant by reason of theVery high amount of viruses used to infect animals30,000 times higher than what a human would use.
A choice consciously taken to limit the number of animals involved, given the danger of the pathogen.
Effectiveness against different variations. According to Geisbert, who in the early 90s was among the discoverers of the Ebola Reston virus, a variant that infects non-human primates, the antibodies developed thanks to the new treatment would have the merit of being wide -sizedUnlike those induced by the therapies with monoclonal antibodies, which are valid only against Zaire Ebolavirus. Currently, the Gilead pharmaceutical house is conducting phase clinical trials with the obeldesivir against the Marburg virus, another pathogen from hemorrhagic fever relative of Ebola.
Hanging on a thread. It is not said, even if we all hope so, that the benefits of the drug observed on the macaques they occur in the same way for man. In any case, this, like many other studies, needs to continue, that the funds intended for the USA to projects that do not directly concern American soil are not deleted.
