Ebola news 9/8

[Buster's Uncle]

Ebola spread is exponential in Liberia, thousands of cases expected soon: WHO
Reuters
8 hours ago



GENEVA (Reuters) - The Ebola virus is spreading fast in Liberia, where many thousands of new cases are expected over the coming three weeks, the World Health Organization said on Monday.

"Transmission of the Ebola virus in Liberia is already intense and the number of new cases is increasing exponentially," WHO said in a statement.

The organization noted that motorbike-taxis and regular taxis are "a hot source of potential virus transmission" because they are not disinfected in Liberia, where conventional Ebola control measures "are not having an adequate impact".

The United Nations agency said aid partners needed to scale up efforts against Ebola by three- to fourfold in Liberia and elsewhere in West African countries battling the epidemic.

In Liberia, the disease has killed 1,089 people among 1,871 cases, the highest national toll, according to the WHO's update of last Friday. Overall in Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone, 2,097 have died out of 3,944 cases. Another 18 cases and seven deaths have been recorded in Nigeria and one non-fatal case in Senegal.

Fourteen of Liberia's 15 counties have reported confirmed cases, the WHO said on Monday. As soon as a new Ebola treatment center is opened, it immediately overflows with patients, "pointing to a large but previously invisible case load".

In Montserrado County, which includes the capital, Monrovia, and is home to more than one million people, a WHO investigative team estimated that 1,000 beds are urgently needed for Ebola patients, the statement said.

"The number of new cases is moving far faster than the capacity to manage them in Ebola-specific treatment centers," it said. "Many thousands of new cases are expected in Liberia over the coming three weeks."

(Reporting by Stephanie Nebehay; editing by Tom Miles, Larry King)


http://news.yahoo.com/ebola-spread-exponential-liberia-thousands-cases-expected-soon-165601614.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Monkey study: Ebola vaccine works, needs booster
Associated Press
By LAURAN NEERGAARD  16 hours ago



This handout file photo taken Sept. 2, 2014, provided by National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) shows a 39-year-old woman, the first participant enrolled in VRC 207, receiving a dose of the investigational NIAID/GSK Ebola vaccine at the National Institute of Health (NIH) Clinical Center in Bethesda, Md. The hope is that the first human safety study of the vaccine might eventually be used in the current Ebola outbreak in West Africa. New monkey studies show that one shot of an experimental Ebola vaccine can trigger fast protection, but the effect waned unless the animals got a booster shot made a different way. (AP Photo/NIAID, File)



WASHINGTON (AP) — New monkey studies show that one shot of an experimental Ebola vaccine can trigger fast protection, but the effect waned unless the animals got a booster shot made a different way.

Some healthy people are rolling up their sleeves at the National Institutes of Health for the first human safety study of this vaccine in hopes it eventually might be used in the current Ebola outbreak in West Africa.

The NIH on Sunday published some of the key animal research behind those injections. One reason the vaccine was deemed promising was that a single dose protected all four vaccinated monkeys when they were exposed to high levels of Ebola virus just five weeks later, researchers reported in the journal Nature Medicine.


Is five weeks fast enough?

That's in line with other vaccines routinely used today, and fortunately it didn't take multiple doses to trigger that much protection, said Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of NIH's National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, whose employees led the work.

The bigger challenge is that the protection wanes over time.



This undated handout photo provided by National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and GlaxoSmithKline (NIAID/GSK) shows a vaccine candidate, in a vial, that will be used in human Ebola trials. The hope is that the first human safety study of the vaccine might eventually be used in the current Ebola outbreak in West Africa. The National Institute of Health on Sunday, Sep. 7, 2014, published some of the key animal research behind such injections. One reason the vaccine was deemed promising was that a single dose protected all four vaccinated monkeys when they were exposed to high levels of Ebola virus just five weeks later, researchers reported in the journal Nature Medicine. (AP Photo/NIAID/GSK)


Researchers exposed monkeys to Ebola 10 months after vaccination, and this time only half were protected.

Partial protection is better than none, Fauci said. But the goal is long-lasting protection, so it was time to try booster shots. The vaccine is made with a chimpanzee cold virus, used as a delivery system for pieces of an Ebola gene. The researchers tried simply giving another dose as a booster two months later. That didn't work well enough.

So they tried a different approach called "prime-boost." The first dose, to prime the immune system, was that original chimp virus-based Ebola vaccine. But for the booster two months later, they made vaccine a different way. They encased the same Ebola gene pieces inside a poxvirus that's used to make a vaccine against smallpox. (Neither vaccine type can cause Ebola.)

This time, all four monkeys still were protected 10 months after the initial shot.

With the Ebola crisis rapidly worsening, the World Health Organization said Friday that it would try to speed the use of certain experimental products, including two vaccine candidates. The WHO said that in November, it expects early results from first-stage studies to see if the vaccine appears safe and triggers an immune reaction in people. That would help determine whether to test the shots' effectiveness in health care workers in West Africa.



This Sept. 4, 2014, file photo shows Nigerian representative Ambrose Isah of the Global Advisory Committee on Vaccine Safety (GACVS), left, talking with World Health Organization (WHO) Health Systems and Innovation Medical Officer Patrick Zuber during a WHO conference with international experts in Geneva, Switzerland, on experimental therapies and vaccines with potential to treat or prevent Ebola virus disease. (AP Photo/Keystone, Christian Brun)


Small animal and human safety studies cannot guarantee that experimental vaccines really work in an outbreak, Fauci said. That's why he emphasizes public health measures such as isolating the sick, quarantine and, especially for health workers, using personal protection equipment.

"Make sure people do what works," he said.

The booster-shot findings illustrate an added complexity to speeding an experimental vaccine into the field. The initial first phase study results would shed light only on that "priming" vaccine made from the chimp cold virus, Fauci said. The poxvirus booster step would be tested later only if scientists decided the initial vaccine was promising enough.

Still, manufacturer GlaxoSmithKline has said it plans to begin manufacturing up to 10,000 doses of the initial NIH-developed vaccine.

Canadian researchers created a similar Ebola vaccine that works in monkeys. Manufacturer NewLink Genetics of Ames, Iowa, said first-stage safety testing in healthy volunteers is set to begin in a few weeks.


http://news.yahoo.com/monkey-study-ebola-vaccine-works-needs-booster-090252099.html

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Second WHO doctor contracts Ebola in Sierra Leone
AFP
1 hour ago



A man stands at a stall on September 8, 2014 next to a billboard about the Ebola virus in a street in Conakry, Guinea (AFP Photo/Cellou Binani )



Freetown (AFP) - The World Health Organization said on Monday that one of its doctors in Sierra Leone has been diagnosed with the Ebola virus and will be evacuated.

"A WHO doctor working in an Ebola treatment centre in Sierra Leone has tested positive for the disease," it said in a statement.

"The doctor is currently in stable condition in Freetown, and will be evacuated shortly."

It is the second WHO employee to contract the virus in Sierra Leone after a Senegalese medical expert was diagnosed in late August and evacuated to Hamburg, Germany, where he was said to be "in a stable condition" on Monday.

The nationality of the latest victim has not been released.

The WHO has provided mentoring and direction at the Ebola treatment centre, which is located in the Kenema Government Hospital.

The centre lost its head doctor, Umar Khan, who died from the virus in late July. He was the country's only virologist and was hailed as a "national hero" by President Ernest Koroma.


http://news.yahoo.com/second-doctor-contracts-ebola-sierra-leone-235525081.html

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Britain to set up Ebola centre in Sierra Leone
AFP
2 hours ago



A woman walks past signs warning of Ebola in Freetown, Sierra Leone, on August 13, 2014 (AFP Photo/Carl de Souza



London (AFP) - Britain is to set up a medical centre to treat victims of the Ebola epidemic in Sierra Leone, the international development secretary said on Monday.

The 62-bed centre near the capital Freetown is planned to be open in eight weeks' time and will be built and operated by military engineers and medical staff.

The worst-ever outbreak of the disease has killed 491 people in Sierra Leone, which is one of three countries at the centre of an epidemic that has claimed over 2,000 lives so far.

"The scale of the problem requires the entire international community to do more to assist the affected countries which is why the UK is working with the Government of Sierra Leone to build a new medical treatment facility near their capital Freetown," said international development secretary Justine Greening.

"When it is up and running it will enable the UK to provide medical care for local and international health workers, as well as treatment for the wider population."

In the long term charity Save the Children may manage the centre, which will have 12 beds dedicated for local and international medical volunteers, the government said.

A British nurse infected with Ebola while working in Sierra Leone recovered from the disease after he was flown out of Africa by military plane and treated in a London hospital.


http://news.yahoo.com/britain-set-ebola-centre-sierra-leone-225105523.html