Ebola updates:

Ebola outbreak still a global emergency: WHO

LONDON -- The World Health Organization says the year-long Ebola outbreak in West Africa still qualifies as an international emergency even though the number of cases has plummeted.

Last August, the UN health agency declared the epidemic of the lethal virus to be a global emergency after the deaths of nearly 1,000 people, mostly in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia.

At the peak last year, hundreds of new cases were being reported every week. In an update this week, WHO reported there were 30 confirmed cases last week in Guinea and Sierra Leone; the last case in Liberia died on March 27.

http://www.ctvnews.ca/health/ebola-outbreak-still-a-global-emergency-who-1.2320510

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Patient admitted with Ebola virus disease discharged from NIH Clinical Center

The American healthcare worker admitted to the NIH Clinical Center on March 13 with Ebola virus disease was discharged today in good condition after having been successfully treated at the NIH Clinical Center Special Clinical Studies Unit. The individual is no longer contagious to the community. At the request of the patient, no further information is being provided.

http://www.nih.gov/news/health/apr2015/nih-09.htm

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Risk of Ebola spreading internationally seems to be dropping: World Health Organization

West Africa's Ebola epidemic still poses a threat to other countries but the risk of it spreading internationally appears to be diminishing as the areas affected shrink, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Friday.

The U.N. agency declared in August 2014 that the world's worst Ebola outbreak, which began in December 2013, represented a "public health emergency of international concern" that forced health officials worldwide to shore up defenses.

http://www.nydailynews.com/life-style/health/risk-ebola-spreading-internationally-drop-article-1.2183223

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Lowest weekly number of Ebola since May 2014. Guinea 21; Sierra Leone 9; Liberia 0. Slowly slowly, but not over yet.
WHO http://apps.who.int/ebola/current-situation/ebola-situation-report-8-april-2015

The biggest success of our time: Child mortality is decreasing rapidly. Everywhere!

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P.O. Box 10787-00100,
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Email: info@aphrc.org

Good.

Testing of Ebola vaccine is underway in Sierra Leone

Sierra Leone has begun testing an experimental Ebola vaccine, officials of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced Tuesday.

The $25 million study, funded through $5.4 billion in Ebola aid authorized by Congress, will test vaccines on 6,000 "front-line workers," including doctors, nurses, burial workers and others, who are at highest risk of the disease.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/04/14/ebola-vaccine-sierra-leone/25763899/

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Nicaragua quarantines US embassy man over Ebola and requests removal

The health ministry in Nicaragua says it has quarantined a member of staff at the US embassy in Managua amid concerns over contact with Ebola.

Nicaragua has asked the US to send a plane to remove him.

The embassy acknowledged the man had travelled to Liberia but he had not come into contact with Ebola patients.

It said he had no sign of haemorrhagic fever and that both the US and Nicaragua's health ministry had cleared him to return.

The embassy said the 51-year-old man had been examined at the Center for Disease Control and Prevention in the US before returning to Nicaragua.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-32296244

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One wonders if this is a political thing or an ignorance thing.

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I'm trying to find out WHO the Nicaraguan official is.
Remove him/her from office.

Nicaraguan officials, are suddenly affecting high alert for an Ebola outbreak in the Central American country.
The Sandinista government issued an alert for the Ebola virus and established a public-health perimeter around the house of the U.S. embassy staffer who recently returned from Liberia.
Nicaraguan health workers said the 51-year-old diplomat has been restricted from leaving his home while the Sandinista government of President Daniel Ortega tries to coordinate his removal from the country and return to the U.S.

The Ebola Virus Epidemic Level of Nicaragua is very Low. The current risk of infection is approximately 0.0063%.

One wonders if this is a political thing or an ignorance thing.

There is a difference?

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Washington says:

Obama pledges continued help in Africa's Ebola fight

WASHINGTON — President Obama told the leaders of three West African nations Wednesday that the United States will continue to help them until the Ebola virus is fully eradicated.

"We're proud to partner with you and we intend to see this through until the job is done," Obama told the presidents of Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone, all hit hard in recent years by Ebola.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2015/04/15/obama-ebola-virus-liberia-sierra-leone-guinea/25812909/

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Ebola survivors 'safe sex warning' issued by WHO

The WHO has urged Ebola survivors to be even more cautious during sexual contact to ensure the virus is not passed on to their partners.

The warning comes after a survivor was found to have traces of Ebola in his semen almost six months after recovery.

This is some 90 days later than previously documented.

http://www.bbc.com/news/health-32284629

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Ebola survivors 'safe sex warning' issued by WHO
The WHO has urged Ebola survivors to be even more cautious during sexual contact to ensure the virus is not passed on to their partners.
The warning comes after a survivor was found to have traces of Ebola in his semen almost six months after recovery.
This is some 90 days later than previously documented.

http://setiathome.berkeley.edu/forum_thread.php?id=75936&postid=1659226#1659226

Good.

Testing of Ebola vaccine is underway in Sierra Leone

Sierra Leone has begun testing an experimental Ebola vaccine, officials of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced Tuesday.

The $25 million study, funded through $5.4 billion in Ebola aid authorized by Congress, will test vaccines on 6,000 "front-line workers," including doctors, nurses, burial workers and others, who are at highest risk of the disease.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/04/14/ebola-vaccine-sierra-leone/25763899/

Woohoo!! Wonder if the vaccine contains ZMapp, cannot find it in the article..

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rOZZ
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Pictures

Case update:

Attorneys for Ebola nurse Nina Pham, Texas Health Resources face off in court; judge issues temporary restraining order

A state district judge Monday momentarily halted efforts by Texas Health Resources to seek a worker’s compensation claim for Ebola nurse Nina Pham.
Attorneys for Pham say THR’s pursuit of a worker’s compensation claim is intended to kill her lawsuit against the healthcare company. But THR argues that the case should be resolved with the worker’s compensation claim and that the lawsuit should be dismissed.

http://thescoopblog.dallasnews.com/2015/04/attorneys-for-ebola-nurse-nina-pham-texas-health-resources-face-off-in-court-judge-issues-temporary-restraining-order.html/

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update.

Ebola drug cures monkeys infected with West African virus strain

An experimental drug has cured monkeys infected with the Ebola virus, US-based scientists have said.

The treatment, known as TKM-Ebola-Guinea, targets the Makona strain of the virus, which caused the current deadly outbreak in West Africa.

All three monkeys receiving the treatment were healthy when the trial ended after 28 days; three untreated monkeys died within nine days.

Scientists cautioned that the drug's efficacy has not been proven in humans.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-32424145

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Fiancee of Ebola Victim Hopes Memoir Closes Chapter

The dark days of quarantine are over, yet Louise Troh remains captive to the disease that killed the man she loved.

"War took the life I made in Liberia. Disease took the life I made in America," she writes in a memoir being released next week.

http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/wireStory/fiancee-ebola-victim-hopes-memoir-closes-chapter-30547955

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Thank you for the updates, Lynn.

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rOZZ
Music
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Thank you for the updates, Lynn. Your welcome Julie.

Despite no new Ebola cases in the West Africa country, the effects of the outbreak will linger for years to come.

Kagbantama, Sierra Leone - In just one month Abdul Kamara, 18, lost his entire family to Ebola.

"My brothers, my sister, my father, my uncle, my grandmom - all of them [died]," he said, recalling how the disease killed all eight people living with him in his father's home in northwestern Sierra Leone.

In total, 90 people died from Ebola in Kagbantama - a dusty collage of mud brick structures of just 1,000 inhabitants where Abdul has lived his entire life.

The United Nations predicts the Ebola outbreak will be over by August 2015, more than a year after it started in Sierra Leone in May of 2014.

http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2015/04/recovering-ebola-sierra-leone-150426065907686.html
Down to zero: Recovering from Ebola in Sierra Leone

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Fort Worth doctor who survived Ebola says fight is not over

The Fort Worth doctor who contracted Ebola in Liberia last year is offering a reminder that the fight against the disease has not yet been won.

“A lot of people in this country have forgotten that Ebola is not over,” Kent Brantly said Saturday at Arlington Christian Bible Fellowship Church.

About 50 people, most of them Liberian, gathered to pray for Ebola survivors and health-care workers who have risked their lives helping others in Africa.

http://www.dallasnews.com/ebola/headlines/20150425-fort-worth-doctor-who-survived-ebola-says-fight-is-not-over.ece

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last update.

Back to school after Ebola. But all is so changed

You may have read some of my diaries before. Since last October, I have written several times in the Observer about how our lives here in eastern Sierra Leone have been affected since we were hammered by Ebola in August. My family survived Ebola (my aunt was infected), but because of stigma – there was name calling, like “Ebola pikin dem” (“Ebola child”) – we were forced to move across town, to a place where no one knew us. Moving solved that problem but not the hunger and the poverty. Depending on hand-outs was horrible.

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/apr/26/ebola-kerema-sierra-leone-back-to-school

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