Researchers volunteer to fight Ebola

The scientists, who all work in the University’s Faculty of Biological Sciences, will each work for five weeks in diagnostic laboratories run by Public Health England in the West African country. Scientists in the laboratories do not work directly with Ebola patients but are vital to the international effort because of the importance of diagnosing cases quickly and accurately. Dr Hazel Stewart, a 29-year-old researcher who has been working on the hepatitis C virus in the University’s School of Molecular and Cellular Biology, is the first of the Leeds researchers to be deployed. She said: “The labs are based near the clinics so the diagnosis can be delivered as quickly as possible. They will send us blood samples from the patients and we will extract and detect Ebola’s genetic material. This lab-based analysis is the most reliable available and they need skilled people on the ground to do it. Dr Stewart has received intensive training for her posting at Public Health England’s laboratories in Porton Down, Salisbury, and traveled to Port Loko in Sierra Leone this week.