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EBOLA PUTS FOCUS ON DRUGS MADE IN TOBACCO PLANTS

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In this Aug. 14, 2014 photo, biotech greenhouse associate specialist Derek Haynes replaces tobacco plants in the greenhouse following examination at Medicago USA, Inc. in Research Triangle Park, N.C. Through its plant-based technology, the facility is capable of producing millions of doses of vaccines. (AP Photo/Gerry Broome)

EBOLA PUTS FOCUS ON DRUGS MADE IN TOBACCO PLANTS

By MALCOLM RITTER
— Aug. 15, 2014 10:22 AM EDT

NEW YORK (AP) — It’s an eye-catching angle in the story of an experimental treatment for Ebola: The drug comes from tobacco plants that were turned into living pharmaceutical factories.

Using plants this way — sometimes called “pharming” — can produce complex and valuable proteins for medicines. That approach, studied for about 20 years, hasn’t caught on widely in the pharmaceutical industry.

But some companies and academic labs are pursuing it to create medicines and vaccines against such targets as HIV, cancer, the deadly Marburg virus and norovirus, known for causing outbreaks of stomach bug on cruise ships, as well as Ebola.

While most of the work in this area uses a tobacco plant, it’s just a relative of the plant used to make cigarettes.

“It’s definitely not something you smoke,” said Jean-Luc Martre, a spokesman for Medicago, a Canadian company that’s testing flu vaccines made with tobacco plants.

Medicago has a new production facility in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina. Once approved by federal authorities, it’s expected to be able to make 30 million doses of seasonal flu vaccine a year, or 120 million vaccine doses to fight a major outbreak of “pandemic” flu if the government requests it.

https://bigstory.ap.org/article/ebola-puts-focus-drugs-made-tobacco-plants

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Ebola Drug Made From Tobacco Plant Saves U.S. Aid Workers

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Ebola Drug Made From Tobacco Plant Saves U.S. Aid Workers

By Robert Langreth, Caroline Chen, James Nash and John Lauerman August 04, 2014

A tiny San Diego-based company provided an experimental Ebola treatment for two Americans infected with the deadly virus in Liberia. The biotechnology drug, produced with tobacco plants, appears to be working.

In an unusual twist of expedited drug access, Mapp Biopharmaceutical Inc., which has nine employees, released its experimental ZMapp drug, until now only tested on infected animals, for the two health workers. Kentucky BioProcessing LLC, a subsidiary of tobacco giant Reynolds American Inc. (RAI:US), manufactures the treatment for Mapp from tobacco plants.

The first patient, Kent Brantly, a doctor, was flown from Liberia to Atlanta on Aug. 2, and is receiving treatment at Emory University Hospital. Nancy Writebol, an aid worker, is scheduled to arrive in Atlanta today and will be treated at the same hospital, according to the charity group she works with. Both are improving, according to relatives and supporters.

https://www.businessweek.com/news/2014-08-04/ebola-drug-made-from-tobacco-plant-saves-u-dot-s-dot-aid-workers

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Ebola terror at Gatwick as passenger collapses and dies getting off Sierra Leone flight

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Ebola terror at Gatwick as passenger collapses and dies getting off Sierra Leone flight
Aug 03, 2014 23:30
By Rebecca Younger, Andy Lines

Staff tell of fears as jet from Africa is quarantined after the death of passenger who was ‘sweating and vomiting’ before she collapsed

Airport staff tonight told of their fears of an Ebola outbreak after a passenger from Sierra Leone collapsed and died as she got off a plane at Gatwick.

Workers said they were terrified the virus could spread globally through the busy international hub from the West African country which is in the grip of the deadly epidemic.

The woman, said to be 72, became ill on the gangway after she left a Gambia Bird jet with 128 passengers on board.

She died in hospital on Saturday.

Ebola has killed 256 people in Sierra Leone.

A total of 826 have died in West Africa since the outbreak began in February.

Tests were carried out to see if the woman had the disease.

The plane was quarantined as ­officials desperately tried to trace everyone who had been in contact with the woman.

Airport workers faced an anxious wait to see if the woman had Ebola. One said: “Everyone’s just ­petrified.

“We’ve all seen how many people have died from Ebola, especially in Sierra Leone, and it’s terrifying.”

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/ebola-terror-gatwick-passenger-collapses-3977051#ixzz39PPqaG7n