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Community => Recreation Commons => Our researchers have made a breakthrough! => Topic started by: Buster's Uncle on January 12, 2015, 09:08:37 pm

Title: Ebola News 1/12
Post by: Buster's Uncle on January 12, 2015, 09:08:37 pm

'Extreme measures' needed to see Ebola shot development through
Reuters
By Kate Kelland  7 hours ago


(http://l2.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/n0pemY9OjWVmhTvKlpytaw--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Zmk9ZmlsbDtoPTMwMDtpbD1wbGFuZTtweW9mZj0wO3E9NzU7dz00NTA-/http://media.zenfs.com/en_us/News/Reuters/2015-01-12T132825Z_2_LYNXMPEB0B0L5_RTROPTP_2_HEALTH-EBOLA-LEONE.JPG)
A health worker wearing protective gear stands outside a quarantine zone in a Red Cross facility in the town of Koidu, Kono district in Eastern Sierra Leone December 18, 2014. REUTERS/Baz Ratner



LONDON, (Reuters) - Developing and bringing to market effective Ebola vaccines requires extreme measures and unprecedented international cooperation, global health experts said on Monday.

In an interim report on a roadmap for vaccines against the current and any future outbreaks of the deadly virus, infectious disease specialists Jeremy Farrar and Mike Osterholm said the scope of effort was "too complex for any single government, organization or company". They called for sustained public-private sector partnership and commitment.

"To bring Ebola vaccines to market, which is clearly in the greater common good given the global consequences of this epidemic, extreme measures are needed to ensure a massive coordinated effort among vaccine manufacturers, government regulatory authorities, government public health agencies, non-governmental organizations and global, national and local leaders," they wrote.

Several potential vaccines are being fast-tracked through development in the hope that one or more may prove able to be used in the world's largest Ebola outbreak in West Africa.

Latest World Health Organization weekly data showed the epidemic has killed 8,235 of the 20,747 people known to be infected worldwide. The vast majority of cases and deaths are in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia.

Two vaccine candidates from GlaxoSmithKline and another from a collaboration between NewLink Genetics and Merck started initial clinical testing in the autumn, while a third from Johnson & Johnson and Bavarian Nordic has just reached the first-in-human testing stage.

The GAVI global vaccines group said last month it would commit up to $300 million to buy Ebola vaccines and will begin procurement as soon as the WHO recommends one.

Yet with case numbers leveling off in the hardest-hit countries, some experts are concerned clinical trials may be slower to report results and political will to see development through may falter.

"Public attention may recede from the current crisis in West Africa, but the likelihood of disease and death from future Ebola outbreaks will not," the interim report said.

"We must not lose sight of the immense contribution that a safe and effective vaccine would make," said Farrar, head of the Wellcome Trust global health charity.

He and Osterholm, director of the University of Minnesota's Center for Infectious Disease Research & Policy (CIDRAP), said success would also provide a model for tackling other deadly infectious diseases, enabling vaccine strategies "to begin without delay in future epidemics".

(Reporting by Kate Kelland; Editing by Janet Lawrence)


http://news.yahoo.com/extreme-measures-needed-see-ebola-shot-development-132522672--finance.html (http://news.yahoo.com/extreme-measures-needed-see-ebola-shot-development-132522672--finance.html)

Title: American Ebola Survivor Dr. Rick Sacra Returning to Africa
Post by: Buster's Uncle on January 12, 2015, 09:09:57 pm

American Ebola Survivor Dr. Rick Sacra Returning to Africa
ABC News
By SYDNEY LUPKIN  1 hour ago


(http://l2.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/oUlOc9G8CZJ9m2hcfPkbzw--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Zmk9ZmlsbDtoPTU0MDtpbD1wbGFuZTtweW9mZj0wO3E9NzU7dz05NjA-/http://media.zenfs.com/en_us/gma/us.abcnews.go.com/HT_Rick_Sacra_ml_150112_16x9_992.jpg)



An American doctor who survived Ebola last fall announced today that he is returning to the heart of the worst Ebola outbreak in history: West Africa.

Dr. Rick Sacra, a family doctor from Massachusetts who contracted Ebola while treating patients in Liberia in September, announced that he is returning to Liberia later this week. He was discharged from Nebraska Medical Center Ebola-free on Sept. 26. He was later re-admitted with an upper respiratory infection and said he also had a complication called uveitis, or swelling of the eye. But he said he's "95 percent" better.

He is set to depart on Jan. 15, and will work at the ELWA hospital with the aid group SIM USA.

"I guess I'm less nervous about this trip because I know what I'm getting into a little more," Sacra said at a news conference this morning at the University of Massachusetts Medical School. "The thing I was afraid of last time, I've had it, and I'm through it. Thank God."

"Doctors say I'm immune, but I don't plan to test that," Sacra said.


http://news.yahoo.com/american-ebola-survivor-dr-rick-sacra-returning-africa-180634737.html (http://news.yahoo.com/american-ebola-survivor-dr-rick-sacra-returning-africa-180634737.html)

Title: Colorado patient to be tested for Ebola: state health officials
Post by: Buster's Uncle on January 13, 2015, 02:34:13 am

Colorado patient to be tested for Ebola: state health officials
Reuters  33 minutes ago



DENVER (Reuters) - A patient being monitored at a Denver hospital will be tested for Ebola, Colorado health officials said on Monday, reversing course after saying earlier the person was at low risk for the deadly virus.

The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment said it would test the patient, who had a history of travel to an Ebola-affected country, out of "an abundance of caution."

State officials said they made their decision to test the patient after consulting with various health officials, including the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. They had said earlier the patient would simply be monitored and evaluated.

The patient's condition has not deteriorated, but no other diagnosis explaining the person's symptoms has been made. As a result, a specimen will be tested at a state lab overnight, said the statement from state officials.

The person, whose name has not been released, was transferred by ambulance to the bio-containment unit of Denver Health Medical Center on Sunday after experiencing a fever, the hospital said in a statement.

"No other patient care areas were exposed and the ambulance has been removed from service," the hospital said, adding that staff members treating the person were isolated from the rest of the hospital and would not be caring for other patients.

The latest World Health Organization weekly data showed the epidemic had killed 8,235 of the 20,747 people known to be infected worldwide. The vast majority of cases and deaths are in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia.

Colorado health officials said the patient could face additional testing after the lab test, as it may take up to three days after Ebola symptoms appear for the virus to reach detectable testing levels.

(Reporting by Keith Coffman and Dan Whitcomb; Editing by Alex Dobuzinskis and Peter Cooney)


http://news.yahoo.com/colorado-patient-tested-ebola-state-health-officials-013533034.html (http://news.yahoo.com/colorado-patient-tested-ebola-state-health-officials-013533034.html)

Title: "Extreme measures" needed to see Ebola shot development through
Post by: Buster's Uncle on January 13, 2015, 03:13:48 am

"Extreme measures" needed to see Ebola shot development through
Reuters
By Kate Kelland, Health and Science Correspondent  13 hours ago


(http://l.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/RaVvSPTaS7BpKXZ1igz9BA--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Zmk9ZmlsbDtoPTMwMDtpbD1wbGFuZTtweW9mZj0wO3E9NzU7dz00NTA-/http://media.zenfs.com/en_ZA/News/Reuters/2015-01-12T134749Z_1007970001_LYNXMPEB0B0LV_RTROPTP_2_OZATP-HEALTH-EBOLA-VACCINES.JPG)
Health workers push a wheeled stretcher holding a newly admitted Ebola patient, 16-year-old Amadou, in to the Save the Children Kerry town Ebola treatment centre outside Freetown, Sierra Leone, December 22, 2014. REUTERS/Baz Ratner



LONDON, Jan 12 (Reuters) - Developing and bringing to market effective Ebola vaccines requires extreme measures and unprecedented international cooperation, global health experts said on Monday.

In an interim report on a roadmap for vaccines against the current and any future outbreaks of the deadly virus, infectious disease specialists Jeremy Farrar and Mike Osterholm said the scope of effort was "too complex for any single government, organization or company". They called for sustained public-private sector partnership and commitment.

"To bring Ebola vaccines to market, which is clearly in the greater common good given the global consequences of this epidemic, extreme measures are needed to ensure a massive coordinated effort among vaccine manufacturers, government regulatory authorities, government public health agencies, non-governmental organizations and global, national and local leaders," they wrote.

Several potential vaccines are being fast-tracked through development in the hope that one or more may prove able to be used in the world's largest Ebola outbreak in West Africa.

Latest World Health Organization weekly data showed the epidemic has killed 8,235 of the 20,747 people known to be infected worldwide. The vast majority of cases and deaths are in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia.

Two vaccine candidates from GlaxoSmithKline and another from a collaboration between NewLink Genetics and Merck started initial clinical testing in the autumn, while a third from Johnson & Johnson and Bavarian Nordic has just reached the first-in-human testing stage.

The GAVI global vaccines group said last month it would commit up to $300 million to buy Ebola vaccines and will begin procurement as soon as the WHO recommends one.

Yet with case numbers levelling off in the hardest-hit countries, some experts are concerned clinical trials may be slower to report results and political will to see development through may falter.

"Public attention may recede from the current crisis in West Africa, but the likelihood of disease and death from future Ebola outbreaks will not," the interim report said.

"We must not lose sight of the immense contribution that a safe and effective vaccine would make," said Farrar, head of the Wellcome Trust global health charity.

He and Osterholm, director of the University of Minnesota's Center for Infectious Disease Research & Policy (CIDRAP), said success would also provide a model for tackling other deadly infectious diseases, enabling vaccine strategies "to begin without delay in future epidemics".


http://news.yahoo.com/extreme-measures-needed-see-ebola-shot-development-134749510--finance.html (http://news.yahoo.com/extreme-measures-needed-see-ebola-shot-development-134749510--finance.html)

Title: Ebola Vaccines: Here's a Look at the 3 Front-Runners
Post by: Buster's Uncle on January 13, 2015, 03:16:13 am

Ebola Vaccines: Here's a Look at the 3 Front-Runners
LiveScience.com
By Bahar Gholipour  20 hours ago



A vaccine against the Ebola virus is urgently needed, and several companies are racing to test their experimental vaccines in an effort to halt the spread of the deadly viral disease. Ebola has sickened more than 20,000 people in West Africa, and killed at least 8,200, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).

Experts estimate that at least 100,000 doses of vaccine are needed to protect   frontline health care workers. And at least 12 million doses would be needed to vaccinate all adults in the three worst-affected countries of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, according to the WHO.

Currently, there are three experimental vaccines that look promising, which are licensed to large pharmaceutical companies, and are now being tested in humans in an exceptionally fast timeline. Here is a look at each of these vaccines.


Johnson & Johnson's Ebola vaccine

This vaccine contains modified versions of a human cold virus and the smallpox virus. It also contains bits of Ebola's genetic material that could incite an immune response against the Ebola virus. On Tuesday (Jan. 6), Johnson & Johnson said it had begun administering its vaccine to healthy volunteers in the United Kingdom. This is a Phase 1 clinical trial, meaning that the researchers will test the vaccine on a small number of people to see if it is safe, and to identify potential side effects.

Seventy-two people will participate in this trial, and will receive either the vaccine or a placebo, the company said. The vaccine involves two shots — the first dose of the vaccine aims to prime the immune system, while a second dose given one or two months later acts to boost the immune response.

In earlier experiments of the vaccine conducted in collaboration with the National Institutes of Health (NIH), researchers found that the vaccine protected monkeys against the strain of Ebola known as Zaire, which is causing the current outbreak, the company said in September.

Janssen Pharmaceutical Cos., which is owned by Johnson & Johnson, is developing the vaccine together with Bavarian Nordic. More than 400,000 regimens of the vaccine have been produced that could be used in larger trials by April.


GlaxoSmithKline's vaccine

Another Ebola vaccine, made by GlaxoSmithKline, is further along in development. The results of the Phase 1 trial of this vaccine were published in The New England Journal of Medicine on Nov. 26, and the research showed that the vaccine, which the company developed in collaboration with the NIH, was well-tolerated and appeared effective.

In the trial, 20 healthy adult volunteers in the United States received the vaccine, and they produced antibodies against Ebola virus, the company said.

Now, Glaxo isplanning to test the vaccine in a larger number of people, and the second phase of the trial may start in February in Africa, according to Reuters.

The vaccine, called cAd3-EBO, is made of a harmless cold virus that affects chimpanzees, but is coated with proteins from two strains of the Ebola virus, the Zaire strain and the Sudan strain.


Merck's vaccine

The Phase 1 testing of Merck's Ebola vaccine is now back on its feet after hitting a bump in the road. Researchers began a Phase 1 trial of the vaccine, called VSV-ZEBOV, in December, but then stopped the trial when some of the volunteers reported experiencing joint pain.

The symptoms, however, resolved without treatment, according to the University of Geneva hospital in Switzerland, where the trial was taking place. The researchers resumed the trial using a lower dose of the vaccine, the hospital announced Jan. 5.

The VSV-ZEBOV consists of a virus that mainly infects animals, called the vesicular stomatitis virus (VSV). In the vaccine, one gene of VSV has been replaced with the gene that codes for the outer protein of the Zaire Ebola virus, according to the NIH.

The vaccine was developed by researchers at the Public Health Agency of Canada's National Microbiology Laboratory, and has been licensed to NewLink Genetics Corp. in Iowa, and Merck & Co.


http://news.yahoo.com/ebola-vaccines-heres-look-3-front-runners-070326797.html (http://news.yahoo.com/ebola-vaccines-heres-look-3-front-runners-070326797.html)