Shelby Anderson
November 20, 2009
10:11 am
A new deadly virus has taken lives in Africa. It is called the “Lujo” and it has the similar symptoms of the Ebola virus. The symptoms include bleeding in the gums and around needle injection sites, fever, shock, coma and organ failure. Scientists are not sure how the first victim, a female travel agent from Lusaka, Zambia, actually acquired the virus in the first place. Scientists from the United States studied the virus and were able to find out that it originated in rodents. They also determined that the virus was spread through person to person contact with infected body fluids. The drug ribavirin is the only drug the know of right now that has helped cure infected patients. The good thing that has come out of this case is the fact that you can see how quickly researchers are able to identify new viruses; this particular virus was identified in only a couple of days. This process used to take weeks!
I think it’s really interesting how advanced technology has become. We have become so advanced that now the process of identifying new viruses takes only a matter of days instead of weeks. Scientists can identify new strains of viruses and find out what actually it takes to cure a person with the virus. Then the drugs that could save a patient’s life can be given to them sooner. Less people would die of these viruses, especially in developing countries like those in Africa. Disease research is very important and I think we should all be very grateful that there are men and women studying these new viruses to protect us.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30989694/
2 comments:
I think its is also cool that we find ways to identify viruses much quicker. It shows that the technological advances that we have are working not only from an economic standpoint but also a medical.
I agree that technology has done great wonders for the medical community.
Post a Comment