Health is my concern

02/05/2020

Covid-19 update:
1195 tests done in the last 24hrs
+24 New cases; 435 Total cases
+2 New Recoveries; 152 Total Recoveries
+1 New Deaths; 22 Total Deaths
261 Total Active Cases

"We must start a serious conversation around the issue of self quarantine if we have to defeat this monster." ~ Dr Mwangangi, CAS, MoH.

02/05/2020

When will we have a coronavirus vaccine?

A vaccine would normally take years, if not decades, to develop. Researchers hope to achieve the same amount of work in only a few months.

Most experts think a vaccine is likely to become available by mid-2021, about 12-18 months after the new virus, known officially as Sars-CoV-2, first emerged.

That would be a huge scientific feat and there are no guarantees it will work.

Four coronaviruses already circulate in human beings. They cause common cold symptoms and we don't have vaccines for any of them.

02/05/2020

The first human trial for a vaccine was announced last month by scientists in Seattle. Unusually, they are skipping any animal research to test its safety or effectiveness

In Oxford, the first human trial in Europe has started with more than 800 recruits - half will receive the Covid-19 vaccine and the rest a control vaccine which protects against meningitis but not coronavirus

Pharmaceutical giants Sanofi and GSK have teamed up to develop a vaccine

Australian scientists have begun injecting ferrets with two potential vaccines. It is the first comprehensive pre-clinical trial involving animals, and the researchers hope to test humans by the end of April

However, no-one know how effective any of these vaccines will be.

02/05/2020

What sort of progress is being made?

Research is happening at breakneck speed. About 80 groups around the world are researching vaccines and some are now entering clinical trials.

01/05/2020

Why is a coronavirus vaccine important?
The virus spreads easily and the majority of the world's population is still vulnerable to it. A vaccine would provide some protection by training people's immune systems to fight the virus so they should not become sick.
This would allow lockdowns to be lifted more safely, and social distancing to be relaxed.

01/05/2020

Coronavirus is spreading around the world, but there are still no vaccines to protect the body against the disease it causes, Covid-19.

01/05/2020

01/05/2020

https://www.facebook.com/NTVKenya/videos/692064094875931/?app=fbl

15/04/2020

basic ways of wearing a mask

15/05/2016

Last year, in an operating room at the University of Toronto, a 63-year-old women with Alzheimer's disease experienced something she hadn't for 55 years: a memory of her 8-year-old self playing with her siblings on their family farm in Scotland.
The woman is a patient of Dr. Andres Lozano , a neurosurgeon who is among a growing number of researchers studying the potential of deep brain stimulation to treat Alzheimer's and other forms of dementia. If the approach pans out, it could provide options for patients with fading cognition and retrieve vanished memories.
Right now, deep brain stimulation is used primarily to treat Parkinson's disease and tremor, for which it's approved by the Food and Drug Administration. DBS involves delivering electrical impulses to specific areas of the brain through implanted electrodes. The technique is also approved for obsessive-compulsive disorder and is being looked at for a number of other brain disorders, including depression, chronic pain and, as in Lozano's work, dementia.
In 2008, Lozano's group published a study in which an obese patient was treated with deep brain stimulation of the hypothalamus. Though no bigger than a pea, the hypothalamus is a crucial bit of brain involved in appetite regulation and other bodily essentials such as temperature control, sleep and circadian rhythms. It seemed like a reasonable target in trying to suppress excessive hunger. To the researcher's surprise, following stimulation the patient reported a sensation of deja vu. He also perceived feeling 20 years younger and recalled a memory of being in a park with friends, including an old girlfriend. With increasing voltages, his memories became more vivid, including remembering their clothes.
Using a 3-dimensional brain mapping technique called standardized low-resolution brain electromagnetic tomography, or
sLORETA, Lozano's group uncovered an explanation for the unexpected findings. They found that stimulating the hypothalamus was in turn driving increased brain activity in the hippocampus, a key cog in the brain's memory circuitry. As Alzheimer's progresses, not only does the hypothalamus atrophy, but electrical communication between neurons in the region also gradually becomes impaired.

15/05/2016

New studies claim that patients carrying HIV may potentially wipe the disease out by adhering to their treatments strictly and properly.
As published in the journal Lancet Infectious Diseases, UCLA researchers studying a decade-long HIV cure in Denmark, beginning in 1995, shared eliminating new infections is actually possible.
They kept track of men who have s*x with other men and found that 98 percent follow through on medications. Decline in HIV has been observed when more treatments were introduced in late 1990s. Only 1.4 new infections for every 1,000 men in 2013 were seen in the said country.
In a press release , senior author and the director of the Center for Biomedical Modeling at UCLA Sally Blower said, "The Danes have done what nobody else in the world has been able to do. They have almost eliminated their HIV epidemic, and they have achieved this simply by providing treatment."
The researchers have also acknowledged Denmark's healthcare system and the availability of free treatment for people infected. "Even in resource-rich countries, this would take a huge amount of money and effort. The goal of elimination through treatment is aspirational, but Denmark has shown that — at least in resource-rich countries — it's achievable," Blower added.
In a related note, reports claim that so-called "super controllers" or "elite controllers" may hold the remedy for patients with HIV that have progressed to AIDS. These are the people defined as the part of a rare population - less than 1 percent - who got infected by the virus but their conditions did not progress into a deadly one. The virus has somehow been prevented from damaging their immune system and scientists are said to be hoping they hold the key in finding the cure.
As previously shared by CBS Sacramento , Loreen Willenberg is part of the 35 million people living with HIV and AIDs. However, in the 23 years since she has been diagnosed she has never been sick and showed no symptoms of the illness even though she is not taking any drugs.
"In a clinical sense, I'm not progressing towards AIDS. I'm not progressing towards the disease stage," she said to the news outlet. She reportedly has been part of 13 studies but the feasibility of "elite controllers" in stopping HIV and AIDS is still inconclusive.