For over a year, thousands of lives from Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone—three of the poorest countries in Africa—were lost due to the deadly Ebola virus. Now, a promising vaccine is seen to put an end to one of the most devastating outbreaks in human history.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) recently reported that a newly developed vaccine against the Ebola virus was found to be "highly effective," raising hopes that the spread of the deadly virus can finally be stopped.
The Ebola vaccine called VSV-EBOV, developed by the Public Health Agency of Canada and licensed to Merck and NewLink, also yielded "100 percent efficacy in individuals" after it was reviewed by international experts from the Data and Safety Monitoring Board.
"This is an extremely promising development... An effective vaccine will be another very important tool for both current and future Ebola outbreaks," WHO Director General Dr. Margaret Chan, Director-General said in a statement.
Chan credited the Guinean government and the communities that participated in the review of the vaccine for the good initial results.
The Ebola vaccine was administered to 7,600 people in Guinea as part of the test, and none of them has so far contracted the deadly disease.
The WHO however recommended further tests on the Ebola vaccine to gather "more conclusive evidence" on its capacity to protect populations through what is called "herd immunity."
Medical experts, however, see promise in the Ebola vaccine. Bertrand Draguez, medical director at Médecins sans Frontières, for instance, said the vaccine can help protect not just ordinary citizens, but also health workers deployed to Ebola-infected areas.
"If the vaccine is effective, then we are already protecting them from the virus. With such high efficacy, all affected countries should immediately start and multiply ring vaccinations to break chains of transmission and vaccinate all frontline workers to protect them," he said.
Assistant Director-General Marie-Paule Kieny, who leads the Ebola Research and Development effort at WHO, said the development of the vaccine against the Ebola virus is a "turning point" in the history of medical research and development.
"We will harness this positive experience to develop a global R&D preparedness framework so that if another major disease outbreak ever happens again, for any disease, the world can act quickly and efficiently to develop and use medical tools and prevent a large-scale tragedy," she said.
