Who’s willing to lend their body to help find a cure for the Zika virus? *crickets* Due to the massive outbreak of the Zika virus in foreign countries to cases popping up in the U.S., researchers are eager to find a cure. But, testing and experimentation comes first. In order to find out what works and what don’t, willing participants must sign on to serve as guinea pigs. Therefore, researchers are asking for volunteers who don’t mind being a science experiment to please come forward ASAP. The testing period will be the winter months. Mosquitoes aren’t prone to bite during the colder months, therefore, this season will allow doctors to conduct research and hopefully create a vaccine that will fight off Zika. “Volunteer” doesn’t mean there’s no money involved. According to the AP, there may be paid volunteer opportunities available. Patients will be inject with different amounts of lab grown Zika virus by December. The testing period will provide information scientists will use to create an experimental vaccine. The testing will take place in a Baltimore hospital. Volunteers given different amounts of Zika would be kept in a Hopkins hospital unit for 12 days, to be sure the virus had cleared the bloodstream, and would have to agree to use condoms for a while afterward to avoid any possibility of sexual transmission. Because Zika usually causes few if any symptoms, those infected might expect a rash or low fever.The second round of the research would recruit volunteers who’d received an experimental vaccine, trying to infect them with Zika six months after their shot. The extra benefit: Tracking people from the moment they’re exposed to Zika also could shed important new light on how the virus affects the body – such as how long it’s infectious in blood, semen and other bodily fluids, and just how the immune system fights it off. (AP)
