Two vaccines in trial and an antibody serum of Ebola to be made available in West Africa as per WHO

Oct 23, 2014 Ruchira Dhoke News 0

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The world will now be eagerly anticipating the much required hope against ebola, as WHO aims to make ebola antibody serum available to the patients within weeks in Liberia, one of the worst hit counties in West Africa by the epidemic. While quantities will be limited it is believed that even a relatively small supply of vaccine can help bring the epidemic under control.

Dr.Marie Paule Kieny,the assistant director general at WHO has announced that  it hopes to begin testing two experimental Ebola vaccines in west Africa by January on more than 20,000 frontline health care workers and others in west Africa  with tens of thousands of doses to be dispensed in the first months of the new year.

She elaborated that the serum is also being developed for use in Liberia based on antibodies extracted from the blood of Ebola survivors. She said “There are partnerships which are starting to be put in place to have capacity in the three countries to safely extract plasma and make preparation that can be used for the treatment of infective patients. The partnership which is moving the quickest will be in Liberia where we hope that in the coming weeks there will be facilities set up to collect the blood, treat the blood and be able to process it for use.”

She further added that “Some vaccines are also in development in Russia. So we are contact with Russians to see when they could be available for testing in Africa. These are quite large trials”

Another WHO spokeswoman, Fadela Chaib,said that an effective vaccine would still not be enough to stop the outbreak but it could at least protect the medical workers who are giving there 100% in the epidemic affected areas as more than 200 of them have died of Ebola.

The vaccine will be made available generally only if it proves to be safe and triggers an adequate immune response in volunteers during the clinical trials that are either on-going or planned in Europe, Africa and the US. The preliminary safety data is expected by the month of December.

Okairos AG is one of the vaccines is being developed by the US National Institutes of Health and GlaxoSmithKline from a modified chimpanzee-cold virus and an Ebola protein. It is being made in Rome, according to GSK, with clinical trials under way in Britain and Mali.

The second vaccine developed by the Public Health Agency of Canada known as VSV-EBOV, is now being tested in healthy volunteers in the US Walter Reed Army Institute of Research in Maryland It would also be tested shortly among volunteers in Switzerland, Germany, Gabon and Kenya, Kieny said.

The European Medicines Agency said that it was ready to offer “orphan” drug status to Ebola treatments and vaccines with the benefits of market exclusivity in an effort to encourage their development.

The outbreak in West Africa has killed more than 4,500 people, mostly in Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone, since it began 10 months ago. Experts have said the world could see 10,000 new cases a week in two months if authorities did not take stronger steps.

The number of infected people in the country’s western region is soaring, with more than 20 deaths a day. The region is on the opposite side of the country from where the first cases emerged. Thus the magnitude of the epidemic is being increased each day which require a quick step to bring it in control if not completely stop. 

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• antibodies, Ebola outbreak, Ebola virus, healthcare workers, Liberia, new drugs, serum, Sierra Leone, vaccines, WHO

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