Ebola vaccine trials in Africa could start by January, says WHO
Experimental drugs have been used on infected patients, but none have been approved by the World Health Organization. There are signs that the Ebola outbreak in West Africa is being contained in some countries.
Experimental drugs have been used on infected patients, but none have been approved by the World Health Organization. There are signs that the Ebola outbreak in West Africa is being contained in some countries.
The World Health Organization said that two vaccines for Ebola could be used in medical trials in West Africa as early as January. An effective vaccine聽鈥� combined with increased international aid and healthcare volunteers 鈥� should help to聽halt an outbreak that鈥檚 infected upwards of 9,000 people and killed at least 4,500, almost all in Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Guinea.
The new vaccines are currently undergoing, or in some cases will soon begin, clinical trials in Europe, Africa, and the United States. Experimental Ebola drugs were used to treat a handful of patients in August, but without clinical testing the WHO has been reluctant to roll it out on a larger scale.
As 海角大神 reported at the time, proceeding with caution with an experimental drug is paramount, particularly 鈥渙n a continent with a history of being on the receiving end" of Western medicines.聽
Ebola's death toll in West Africa has been devastating, but there have been some positive signs of progress in containing the outbreak. Nigeria and Senegal were both declared Ebola free this month. The Monitor鈥檚 Dan Murphy writes:
Public health workers and volunteers fighting on the front lines in West Africa have provided vital information and first-hand accounts of what it takes to combat the spread of Ebola.
Leslie Roberts, a public health researcher at聽Columbia University,聽is working in Sierra Leone. In a recent blog post he writes about the so-called 鈥渟urvivor bias.鈥� He writes that there are clinics boasting of high survival rates, but that that shouldn鈥檛 necessarily be a sign of success; he鈥檚 more impressed with the lack of infection on the part of health workers in these clinics.
Prof. Roberts writes that the survival rates at these clinics may be explained by their patients' histories: Those who are successful treated likely聽survive at least a week with symptoms, as well as an additional three to four days at the clinics awaiting test results.
And sending a message to patients that the longer they delay seeking treatment the higher their chance of survival is 鈥渢he opposite of the message we want to get out,鈥� Roberts writes. He also notes other cases of bias operating during this outbreak. For example, he's heard over and over that this outbreak has lower fatality rates than those in the past. Roberts suspects that the truth lies in underreporting, relatives conducting secret burials, or more surveillance in urban areas than in rural ones.
Sean Casey, who is working as a team lead at an Ebola treatment unit in Liberia, has evidence that might back that up. His facility runs a burial site behind the treatment center, he said in an interview with Ebola Deeply:
Mr. Casey said his team has seen "a slight dip in caseload," however, "a slowing of the infection rate isn't necessarily a good thing. It might mean that people aren't coming forward. Many ETUs have scaled up cremations instead of burials, and some people might be scared away by that ...
"But it's always difficult to tell what's happening with an epidemic as you're looking at it; it's much easier retrospectively."