Ukraine in Arabic | Ebola vaccine trial results positive, US says
KYIV/Ukraine in Arabic/ US researchers say an experimental Ebola vaccine appears safe.
It is designed to stimulate the body’s immune system to produce Ebola antibodies.
Volunteers testing the vaccine developed antibodies within four weeks of getting shots at the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
The results were published in the New England Journal of Medicine as the World Health Organisation updated the numbers of people affected by the Ebola epidemic. By the end of November 23, it said, there had been 15,935 reported cases and 5,689 deaths. The actual figures are thought to be much higher.
GlaxoSmithKline’s vaccine, developed with the National Institutes of Health in the US, is one of three being speeded into trials in the Ebola-hit countries of west Africa. It is hoped that they can be tested on healthcare workers, burial teams and others at high risk of infection in January.
All vaccines must go through safety testing. Results from the vaccination of the first healthy volunteers in the United States show no ill-effects. All 20 developed antibodies to the virus, according to the paper.
“We are very encouraged by these positive first trial results showing this type of vaccine has an acceptable safety profile and can produce an immune response against Ebola in humans,” said Dr Moncef Slaoui, chairman of global vaccines at GSK.
“It’s important to remember that these data are the first piece in the jigsaw and we’re continuing to gather other important information. Over the coming weeks, we will see results from further phase 1 trials which will tell us more about the profile of the monovalent vaccine; most significantly results from a trial in Mali which is assessing its safety and immune response in West African populations.”
If the results are all positive, thousands of volunteers including healthcare workers will be vaccinated in early 2015 in Liberia and Sierra Leone and possibly also Guinea, he said. “If the candidate vaccine is able to protect these healthcare workers as we hope it will, it could significantly contribute to efforts to bring this epidemic under control,” he said.
