DR Congo approves trial Ebola vaccine
Print Edition
THE Democratic Republic of Congo has approved using an experimental Ebola vaccine to combat an outbreak of the virus in the northeast.
“The DRC accepts the use of vaccines against the Ebola virus,” a source in the health ministry said, adding that the government has no objections to the tests being conducted in the country.
“We’re waiting for an operational plan from our partners which will determine what steps need to be taken, in which geographic areas we could vaccinate,” the source added, on condition of anonymity.
The source said a definitive decision on how the vaccine would be deployed will be released in 24 hours.
There is no licensed vaccine for the Ebola virus, but the World Health Organization said this month that a candidate vaccine exists and could be deployed within a matter of days with DR Congo government approval.
On May 12, DR Congo declared an outbreak of the highly contagious disease, the eighth to date. A week later, researchers in the United States said they had found antibodies that could be used to neutralise the three main strains of Ebola.
So far, two cases of the virus have been confirmed in a laboratory while 18 others are suspected in the remote Bas-Uele province, an equatorial forest zone near the Central African Republic.
Three of those people have died. The first was a 39-year-old man who died on the way to hospital in Likati on April 22. It is the first outbreak of Ebola since the west Africa epidemic ended in January last year, killing more than 11,300 people and infecting 29,000.
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