Qld: New drug treatment offered to people exposed to Hendra

AAP General News (Australia)
08-12-2009
Qld: New drug treatment offered to people exposed to Hendra

By Jessica Marszalek

BRISBANE, Aug 12 AAP - Four people who were significantly exposed to Hendra virus at
a Queensland horse nursery have been offered a new treatment that may stop them falling
ill with the deadly disease.

Tests have confirmed a prized Anglo filly from J4S Equine Nursery at Cawarral, east
of Rockhampton, died from Hendra virus on Saturday, with two other recent horse deaths
on the property also attributed to the virus.

Another horse that has fallen sick on the property is being tested for the virus, with
the results due on Thursday.

Chief Health Officer Jeannette Young said specialists at Brisbane's Princess Alexandra
Hospital had devised a plan to use ribavirin, a drug normally used to treat chronic hepatitis,
on the four people most exposed to the sick horses.

It would be the first time the drug has been used this way.

The antiviral treatment would be offered at Rockhampton Base Hospital via a five-day
infusion, Dr Young said.

"We don't know if it will work," she told reporters in Brisbane.

"Theoretically it could work, and there's been some animal studies that suggest it
might work at stopping someone getting the disease who has had significant exposure."

The four people are expected to decide in the next two days whether they will take
up the treatment, she said.

They are among 13 who came into contact with infected horses on the property and are
awaiting test results available in two to three weeks.

Symptoms usually appear within five to 16 days of contact with infected horses.

A Hendra outbreak in August last year killed Brisbane vet Ben Cunneen, the first person
in Australia to die of the disease in 10 years.

Meanwhile, Biosecurity Queensland acting chief veterinary officer Dr Rick Symons said
25 horses on the infected property and 11 that travelled from it to NSW and other parts
of Queensland are being tested.

He said any found to be infected would be destroyed.

"We're confident that the property is in quarantine, we've got the other horses in
isolation, so I'm confident we've got everything under control," he told reporters in
Brisbane.

The virus is a serious but rare disease believed to be transferred from bats to horses.

Dr Symons said a bat research team was on the property on Wednesday studying bat droppings
to gain a greater understanding of how to stop the virus spreading to horses.

But the research would not lead to a cull and vaccination was not available, he said.

"I think we have to accept the fact that animals carry diseases and we need to manage
those diseases," he said.

"They are in Queensland, it's not a matter of eliminating bats, it's really a matter
of working out the disease, how it's transmitted, which then gives us a greater ability
to actually be able to deal with that."

Horses can pass on the virus to humans, but health authorities say there is no record
of human-to-human transmission.

AAP jmm/ldj/apm

KEYWORD: HENDRA WRAP (FILE PIX AVAILABLE)

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