Ebola - The Cause to the Effect?

It was reported at the CTV news website, that a Liberian by the name of Salome Karwah was diagnosed in August, along with six other members of her family. She was treated at Doctors without Borders/MSF clinic in Monrovia and survived, although her mother and father died. Karwah says she was left completely weakened by the illness and remembers experiencing "overpowering" pain that lasted several days.

"Ebola is like a sickness from a different planet. It comes with so much pain. It causes so much pain that you can feel it in your bones. I’d never felt pain like this in my lifetime," she writes.

CTV narrated that, “Ebola begins much like the flu, with fever and fatigue. It then becomes more like a gastrointestinal infection or food poisoning, causing severe vomiting and diarrhea. The infection eventually affects every organ in the body and patients typically die from septic shock or organ failure. The virus attacks immune cells which send out proteins that lead to inflammation. That inflammation damages blood vessels, causing them to leak, which can trigger the bleeding seen in some -- but not all -- Ebola patients”.

CTV further reports that “Treatment involves replacing fluids and electrolytes, transfusions to replace lost blood, and interventions to maintain blood pressure and breathing. The earlier these treatments begin the better, as doctors have found that by the time the disease progresses to hemorrhaging, it's usually too late to save the patient's life.Many who survive an Ebola infection have few lasting effects. But others are weakened by the infection and live with lasting kidney or liver damage. There have also been reports of patients who endure long-lasting joint inflammation, hair loss, and chronic eye and ear problems.The virus can sometimes still be found in the system of survivors for several weeks, even after they begin to test negative for Ebola. The World Health Organization says it has noted cases in which the virus has remained in the semen of Ebola survivors for up to seven weeks after recovery.”

Read more: http://www.ctvnews.ca/health/health-headlines/what-is-it-like-to-survive-ebola-1.2058805#ixzz3GZyuyFRK

The foregoing testimony of a purported Ebola survivor is descriptive of the dreadfulness of the disease along with its lasting and damaging effect even after the virus has left the body. Even more chilling is that the World Health Organization (WHO) declared that the Ebola mortality rate is at 70 percent, and that presently the virus is transmitted via direct contact with the body fluids of an infected individual. The health authorities in the  US had hinted the possibility of virus mutation and with that a corresponding change could occur in the mode through which the virus is transmitted from direct contact to being airborne.

Accordingly, there is a growing fear that the outbreak in West Africa, particularly in Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone would cross border causing uncontrolled progression of the disease into a pandemic that could at worse eradicate some or most of the world population. The major news outlet particularly in the United States is perpetually suggesting the possibility of that scenario. Notwithstanding however, around 3000-4000 US troops will be sent or is being send to West Africa supposedly to assist in the Ebola containment operation/s. If ever, one can imagine that there are 3000-4000 chances that those US troops could bring the Ebola infection to their families and the western population, unless the untested vaccine were administered beforehand to those troops, or there is something other than what is being told and seen that exuberates confidence on not contracting the disease . Nevertheless, if the case is the former, that would afford the pharmaceutical companies the bureaucratic free administration of experimental vaccines and the field testing of the curative potency of any new drugs as well.

In not too recent past a patent for Ebola virus is said to have been acquired by the US government through the US Health Department. This could mean that the virus maybe preserved, cultivated only by the US government, and under its auspices and direction may be utilize for the development of prophylactic or therapeutic drugs. It is notable that some of the pharmaceutical companies with pending application with US FDA were said to have been commissioned by the US Department of Defense for such purpose. Noteworthy, is the report that Liberia is yet to ratify and accede to the Biological Weapons Convention. Thus, it is not bound to observe its prohibitions and established protocols.

The Ebola cure and vaccine development was reported to have been going on for decades, but its testing on human subjects is yet to materialize primarily due to cost and benefit consideration. The cost of testing could run into hundreds of millions of Dollars, and assuming that the test result would warrant the United States Federal Drug Administration’s (FDA) approval for use on human subjects, the prospective market for the cure and preventive vaccine is almost -nil- in relation to the magnitude of required investment. In the absence of the test to prove that the vaccine or drugs are safe for humans, the FDA has held in abeyance the approval of the vaccine/drugs developed by pharmaceutical companies in and outside the United States.

Subsequently however, at the hype of the Ebola outbreak as declared by the World Health Organization, it was reported that the FDA had relaxed the requirement against the use of experimental drugs and vaccines to a partial hold. This means that the drug companies could enjoy the opportunity to employ the experimental drugs even without the benefit of safety testing for humanitarian cause which consequently would somehow fulfill some of the required human testing sans the cost and time factor. In  this regard, the stock prices of the pharmaceutical companies involved in Ebola drug and vaccine development reportedly has soared dramatically on the prospect of its worldwide use amid the Ebola fear.

The hotbeds of the Ebola crisis have something in common. All of those states namely Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone are naturally and abundantly endowed with recently discovered and unexploited oil reserves, uranium deposits, gold and most especially diamonds. The Chinese has already gained an economic influence and foothold in Africa and is now creeping fast towards its natural resources. What is notable and relevant to this is that the US troops is alleged to have stationed itself near the recently discovered diamond site in Liberia and reports claimed that it could have been one of the upstream sources of alluvial diamond in Liberia.

Amid the perceived or real threat of Ebola to the world, one cannot help but wonder how the virus which was believe to have been contained if not totally eradicated had suddenly came about so strong in a rebound; one may also wonder how did an organism such as the Ebola Zaire virus mutated to be more powerful than the previous strain even at the onset of its initial onslaught without being present first inside a body of a host victim/s; how was the previous outbreaks since 1976 were contained without the administration of vaccine/s? Moreover, is it not more logical to send thousands of trained medical workers instead of thousands of combat troops to the Ebola ground zero for purposes of treatment and containment? Combat troops can be useful however if the purpose is to seal that area to deny ingress or egress to the point that even representatives of the host state can be denied access… an area that is equivalent to a base?  The French by the way already has a base in Mali while the British has a station in Sierra Leone.

The answer may stir more wonder and entice inquisitiveness altogether, especially if one is presented with the foregoing information, events and circumstances that are puzzling to intriguing… even so… are too glaring to be rather of a co-incidence to be overlooked and dismissed as such. Whatever this all means, I shall leave to the reader’s own level of curiosity and unbiased judgment.

May the Divine Providence prevail above all!!