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UN Security Council to Hold Emergency Meeting on Ebola Crisis

un.org

15 September 2014 – The United Nations Security Council will hold an emergency meeting on Thursday to discuss the Ebola outbreak that has gripped West Africa, the president of the 15-member body announced today.

The outbreak, affecting Guinea, Liberia, Nigeria and Sierra Leone, is unprecedented in scope – with more than 4,000 cases having been reported across the region and over 2,200 deaths. It has also dealt a major blow to the already fragile health care systems in West Africa.

“The trend lines in this crisis are grave and without immediate international action we are facing the potential for a public health crisis that could claim lives on a scale far greater than current estimates and set the countries of West Africa back a generation,” Ambassador Samantha Power of the United States, which holds the Council’s presidency for September, told reporters at UN Headquarters.

The meeting – requested by the US owing to the “increasingly grim situation,” particularly in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea – is expected to hear from Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, as well as senior UN officials dealing with the Ebola crisis.

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Respiratory Virus Enterovirus D68 Spreads to the Northeast

      

Respiratory Virus Enterovirus D68 Spreads to the Northeast (ABC News)

ABC News - by Geetika Rudra - September 14, 2014

Enterovirus D68, the respiratory illness suspected of hospitalizing hundreds of children across the nation, has now spread to the Northeast and is likely to hit the whole country. . .

. . . As of Saturday, enterovirus D68 had spread to 21 states across the Midwest and East Coast, with confirmed cases spanning from New Mexico to Montana to Delaware.

The virus is likely to spread across the country, ABC News' Dr. Richard Besser said Sunday morning.

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U.S. Scientists See Long Fight Against Ebola

 A woman in Monrovia, Liberia, passed a man believed to be infected with Ebola. Researchers say it could take 12 to 18 months to bring the epidemic under control. Credit Abbas Dulleh/Associated Press

Image: A woman in Monrovia, Liberia, passed a man believed to be infected with Ebola. Researchers say it could take 12 to 18 months to bring the epidemic under control. Credit Abbas Dulleh/Associated Press

nytimes.com - September 12th, 2014 - Denise Grady

The deadly Ebola outbreak sweeping across three countries in West Africa is likely to last 12 to 18 months more, much longer than anticipated, and could infect hundreds of thousands of people before it is brought under control, say scientists mapping its spread for the federal government.

“We hope we’re wrong,” said Bryan Lewis, an epidemiologist at the Virginia Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech.

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President Barack Obama to discuss US response to the Ebola epidemic

Sep 13 2014 - 6:10am by Charles Omedo - thewestsidestory.net

Come next week, the United States president, Barack Obama will get personal briefing on the Ebola virus situation in West Africa from medical experts working on the epidemic, and he will also use the opportunity to lay out his government’s response plan for combating the deadly epidemic.

Four American doctors and nurses have contracted the fatal disease but were lucky to have survived after being flown back to the US for treatments with experimental drugs and blood serums. The disease has however killed over 2,550 victims according to the World Health Organization (WHO) and over 4,300 currently infected with the epidemic in West Africa.

http://thewestsidestory.net/2014/09/13/16496/president-barack-obama-discuss-us-response-ebola-epidemic/

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American Ebola Survivor Gives Blood to Infected Health-Care Colleague

Steven Reinberg HealthDay Reporter - THURSDAY, Sept. 11, 2014 (HealthDay News)

An American medical missionary who survived infection with Ebola has donated blood to a colleague who's struggling to fight his own infection with the often deadly virus.

Dr. Rick Sacra was given blood transfusions from Dr. Kent Brantly last Friday, shortly after arriving at the Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha. The 51-year-old Sacra has also been given an experimental drug and other treatments, hospital officials said.

http://www.philly.com/philly/health/topics/HealthDay691687_20140911_American_Ebola_Survivor_Gives_Blood_to_Infected_Health-Care_Colleague.html

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Hundreds of children across US sickened by severe respiratory virus

 A CDC spokesman said the agency is testing to see if the virus caused illnesses reported in children in Alabama, Colorado, Georgia, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Ohio, Oklahoma and Utah. Photograph: David Goldman/APtheguardian.com - Monday 8 September 2014 21.24 BST

Suspected virus, enterovirus 68, typically causes illness lasting a week and most children recover with no lasting problems.

Hundreds of children in more than 10 states have been sickened by a severe respiratory illness that public health officials say may be caused by an uncommon virus similar to the germ that causes the common cold.

Nearly 500 children have been treated at one hospital alone – Children’s Mercy in Kansas City, Missouri – and some required intensive care, according to authorities.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/sep/08/children-respiratory-virus-illinois-missouri

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Toxic Tide Shows Up Early in Sag Harbor

High levels of Cochlodinium detected in Sag Harbor cove last week could put shellfish and finfish at risk.13 August 2014 - By Mara Certic

Just weeks after blue-green algal blooms were detected in Georgica Pond, extremely high levels of the toxic rust alga Cochlodinium have emerged in Sag Harbor and East Hampton waters.

Cochlodinium first appeared on Long Island in 2004 and has been detected in local waters every summer since. According to Professor Christopher Gobler, who conducts water quality testing and is a professor at Stony Brook University’s School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences, densities above 500 cells per milliliter can be lethal to both finfish and shellfish. The Gobler Laboratory recorded Cochlodinium at densities exceeding 30,000 cells per milliliter in Sag Harbor Cove, and over 1,000 in Accabonac and Three Mile Harbors.

http://sagharborexpress.com/toxic-tide-shows-up-early-in-sag-harbor/

http://sagharboronline.com/sagharborexpress/page-1/toxic-tide-shows-up-early-in-sag-harbor-32598

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Zoetis Granted Conditional License by USDA for PEDv Vaccine

submitted by Albert Gomez     

          

Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, February 1, 2013.  Credit: Reuters/Brendan McDermid

reuters.com - by P.J. Huffstutter and Tom Polansek - September 3, 2014

(Reuters) - Zoetis Inc has received a conditional license from the U.S. Department of Agriculture for its vaccine against a deadly piglet virus and will begin selling it this month in the United States, the company said on Wednesday.

Shares of Zoetis, the world's largest animal-health company, reached an all-time high of $36.65 and were up 0.7 percent at $35.73 in afternoon trading on the New York Stock Exchange.

With its new vaccine, Zoetis joins a growing push by both the agriculture and pharmaceutical industries to combat the spread of porcine epidemic diarrhea virus (PEDv), which has killed about 13 percent of the U.S. hog herd over the past year.

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Ebola Outbreak: Call to Send in Military to West Africa to Help Curb Epidemic

Head of Médecins sans Frontières says the world is 'losing the battle' as cases and deaths continue to surge

MSF - theguardian.com - by Sarah Boseley - September 2, 2014

Military teams should be sent to west Africa immediately if there is to be any hope of controlling the Ebola epidemic, doctors on the frontline told the United Nations on Tuesday, painting a stark picture of health workers dying, patients left without care and infectious bodies lying in the streets.

The international president of Médecins sans Frontières (MSF), Dr Joanne Liu, told member states that although alarm bells had been ringing for six months, the response had been too little, too late and no amount of vaccinations and new drugs would be able to prevent the escalating disaster.

"Six months into the worst Ebola epidemic in history, the world is losing the battle to contain it," Liu said.

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HHS Contracts with Mapp Biopharmaceutical to Develop Ebola Drug

                               

Work will accelerate drug development and testing

hhs.gov - News - Press Release - September 2, 2014

The development of a medication to treat illness from Ebola will be accelerated under a contract with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response (ASPR). This contract supports the government-wide response to the Ebola outbreak in West Africa.

ASPR’s Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) will provide funding as well as access to subject matter expertise and technical support for manufacturing, regulatory, and nonclinical activities through a $24.9 million, 18-month contract with Mapp Biopharmaceutical Inc., of San Diego, California. ASPR can extend the contract up to a total of $42.3 million.

Work under the contract supports the development and manufacturing of the medication ZMapp toward the goal of U.S. Food and Drug Administration approval.

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