Breaking: Indians uncover cure for deadly Zika virus

Those infected by the Zika virus can heave a sigh of relief now as they hope to get a jab of the newly developed world’s first antidote to the bug the World Health Organisation declared a global emergency Tuesday.

An Indian big pharma, International Biotech Ltd, based in Hyderbad, claimed on Wednesday to have developed a vaccine against the malaise.

“We are probably the first vaccine company in the world to file a vaccine candidate patent about nine months ago,” Dr Krishna Ella told a press conference.

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Ella, who heads the company, said they sought the Indian government assistance for carrying out human and animal trials for the two candidate vaccines developed by the company’s scientists using a live Zika virus.

India has yet to have an index of the outbreak, but over 4000 people in Brazil have come down with the virus which attack foetus brains and shrinks the baby’s head in pregnant women.

While WHO believes the outbreak has hit an alarming rate, its stakeholders said the can only suspect a causal relationship between microcephalus and Zika infection in women.

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Nigeria has not recorded a case either, though the Aedis mosquitoes which host and transmit the microbe are present in the country and a couple of other African nations.

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