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Sunday, February 22, 2004Dr. Casals first felt ill in June 1969, shortly after he began working with the virus. But he said he did not think he had Lassa fever because his severe thigh-muscle aching was a symptom the nurses had escaped. A friend persuaded him to go to Columbia-Presbyterian. As Dr. Casals's illness became increasingly severe, his doctors grew to suspect the virus he was investigating. In desperation, his doctors had Ms. Pinneo [the only surviving victim among three US missionaries who were infected -ed.] fly to Manhattan from her home in Rochester so that doctors could take some of her blood, separate the plasma part that contained the antibodies that allowed her to recover, and inject them into Dr. Casals. But the procedure, untested for the fever, was at best risky. "We gathered in a room and debated that thing up and down, back and forth, while Jordi was sinking very, very fast," Dr. Tignor said. "We did not know for sure whether giving him those antibodies would be a good thing or a bad thing, but we decided to go ahead, and we held our breath. It was downright scary." The antibodies saved Dr. Casals's life. He continued the research until a technician on the team, Juan Roman, died in December 1969. posted by Sydney on 2/22/2004 10:31:00 PM 0 comments 0 Comments: |
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