A new research has revealed that a compound found in an Asian herb may help in treating Ebola.
Dr. Robert Davey, scientist and Ewing Halsell Scholar in the Department of Immunology and Virology at Texas Biomedical Research Institute announced that a small molecule called Tetrandrine derived from an Asian herb has shown to be a potent small molecule inhibiting infection of human white blood cells in vitro or petri dish experiments and prevented Ebola virus disease in mice.
Researchers studied several existing drugs currently used to treat high blood pressure in order to find out which small molecules were best at blocking the Ebola virus from moving any further through the cell.
Tetrandrine protected mice from disease without obvious side effects, and appeared to be the most potent of the compounds tested.
Essentially, this drug shows an ability to stop the virus before it has a chance interact with cellular factors, thus stopping the virus from continuing its infection process.
There's no drug on the market to treat Ebola, which has killed more than 9,000 people, mainly in West Africa, since 2013 in the world's largest outbreak to date.
The study is published in the journal Science.