By Hanning Mbabazi
Health Minister, Ruth Aceng in a Tuesday tweet confirmed that health workers have been approved to use three experimental Ebola treatments in the country.
“Happy to inform you all that we got clearance from both Uganda National Council for Science and Technology and National Drug Authority to bring in the Therapeutic treatment for Ebola patients in the country.” Uganda’s Health Minister Ruth Aceng, tweet reads.
This came a week after the deadly disease spread over the border from Democratic Republic of Congo to Uganda’s western District of Kasese.
The World Health Organisation spokesperson also said that “medicine approved for shipment to Uganda were Mapp Biopharmaceutical’s ZMapp, Regeneron Pharmaceuticals Inc’s Regeneron and Remdesivir, made by Gilead Sciences. “The protocols for the fourth being submitted. Logistics underway with MSF support for importation of a few courses about 10 each,” he added in an email.
The U.N. health agency has said there have so far been no known cases of Ebola spreading between people in Uganda, all recorded patients had travelled in from Congo.
Four experimental therapeutic treatments are already being used in Congo, it added.
Health workers and people who came in contact with infected people began receiving a Merck experimental vaccine in Uganda on Saturday.
