Guinea’s last Ebola patient leaves hospital
A one-month-old baby girl, who was Guinea's last Ebola patient, was discharged from the hospital on Nov 28. Baby Nubia, reported to be the outbreak’s youngest case, marked Guinea’s official Ebola-free status, if no new cases will be reported 42 days following her recovery.
Baby Nubia, who was born to an infected mother, has become the symbol of the Ebola treatment ward managed by Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) or Doctors Without Borders in Conakry, NBC News reports. She has been called a good warrior when her survival defied expectations, whie most babies born to infected mothers usually die.
"This is a very happy day for us," Laurence Sailly, head of MSF, told Reuters. "It was very moving for us and the family to be able to touch her without gloves."
The medical staff were delighted when the child was tested negative for a second time after the outbreak has killed about 11,300 people in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone. Sailly claims that Nubia survived due to the drug ZMapp, an antibody treatment and GS-5734, an experimental anti-viral medicine.
ZMapp, by Mapp Biopharmaceutical and LeafBio, is an experimental drug of specially engineered antibodies designed to target and inactivate the Ebola virus. Two US citizens infected with Ebola were the first recipients. However, officials declared that the improvements were not necessarily the result of the drug since these have only been tested in monkeys, where 43 percent of the animals survived the virus, the Independent states. It should be noted that it is not a cure, experts still stick to traditional health measures such as identification, quarantine, isolation and education to manage Ebola.
"When she started having convulsions, we thought the virus had entered the brain and that's when we started the anti-viral," Sailly noted. "Everyone was following hour by hour."
"We want Ebola to leave this country. The baby is cured, and may God strengthen her health," a resident of Conakry said. "All this is a source of joy for us."
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