Ebola vaccines to be tested soon
Print Edition
The World Health Organization said yesterday that the two leading Ebola vaccines appear safe and will soon be tested in healthy volunteers in West Africa.
After an expert meeting this week, the WHO said there is now enough information to conclude that the two most advanced Ebola vaccines — one made by GlaxoSmithKline and the other licensed by Merck and NewLink — have “an acceptable safety profile.”
In a press briefing yesterday, Dr Marie-Paule Kieny, who heads the WHO’s Ebola vaccine efforts, said “the cupboard (for Ebola vaccines) is filling up rapidly.”
Further trials in healthy people in West Africa, including health workers, are scheduled to start soon, she said, adding that other vaccines were being developed in the United States, Russia and elsewhere.
Despite the temporary suspension of a trial of the vaccine made by NewLink and Merck last month, Kieny said there was no sign of significant side effects.
The trial was put on hold while experts investigated reports of “transient, mild” joint pain in a number of participants. It was an unexpected side effect but Kieny said it was not worrying enough to stop the vaccine’s development. No such side effects have been reported with the other vaccine.
The next phase of trials will likely take about six months and manufacturers will ramp up their production at the same time, meaning millions of doses could be available later this year. It’s unclear if that will be quick enough to help slow the epidemic, which is mostly on the decline.
So far, Ebola is believed to have sickened more than 20,000 people and killed about 8,000, mostly in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.
“We will have to take stock when we have the vaccines,” said Helen Rees of the University of Witwatersrand, who chaired the WHO meeting.
Experts will have to consider at that point whether it’s useful to vaccinate entire populations or focus only on high-risk groups, she said.
Dr Peter Piot, the co-discoverer of the Ebola virus, said he was concerned there might be too few cases to prove the vaccines worked. But he said all options should be pursued.
“With Ebola, you need to find every last case and stop all transmission. It may be we won’t be able to do that without a vaccine,” he said.
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