Ebola Cure? DRC, WHO, and NIH Remain Hopeful

On 14 January 2016, the World Health Organization declared that Ebola had been eradicated. The 9th meeting of the Emergency Committee convened by the WHO Director-General under the International Health Regulations (2005) (IHR) regarding the Ebola virus disease (EVD) outbreak in West Africa took place by teleconference on Tuesday, 29 March 2016 from 12:30 until 15:15 hr.

African countries have acted swiftly and decisively during the Corona Virus pandemic. Many Countries, such as Ghana and Kenya have closed their borders to European travelers and others have even deported European citizens back to their countries.

Many are wondering if these measures are the reason why the number of Coronavirus cases are so low, others are questioning whether or not the African nations have the means to test the population. The answer to the low Coronavirus numbers may in fact be due, in part, to the infrastructure that was maintained since the Ebola crisis, a virus that claimed more than 11,000 lives in West Africa alone.

For the past six years, Many African countries have been maintaining and strengthening their defenses against highly contagious diseases. Some countries, like Nigeria, have even created National laboratories to study these diseases. The continent’s dedicated, hard work has paid off with the creation of not one, but two Ebola vaccines though only one is FDA approved.

The Ebola Virus was first recognized as a disease in the Democratic Republic of Congo and the Sudan in 1976. This disease spreads rapidly through contact with infected body fluids. It’s an extremely lethal virus and during the early outbreaks the disease had a 90% mortality rate.

Ebola killed so quickly in its early days , in fact, that people would die of the virus before they would be able to pass it to others. This trait kept its outbreaks to small, rural areas in Africa and it remained a low impact disease, infecting 2,400 people and killing 1,600 from its discovery in 1976 to the 2014 epidemic.

Ervebo, the first and currently the only FDA approved Ebola vaccine was developed and made By Merck & Co. a global healthcare company based in New-Jersey. The vaccine is said to be 100% effective if administered at least 10 days before potential exposure. The vaccine will be available near the end of 2020 and though Merck & Co. have yet to decide on a price, they have been working with Gavi, a nonprofit group that supports the global vaccine program and has strong ties in sub-Saharan Africa.

In 2014 Gavi committed $300 Million USD to manufactures as an incentive to invest in the creation of an Ebola Vaccine. By January of 2015 the Merk Vaccine was being tested in Guinea where 12,000 people who had come into contact with individuals that showed symptoms of Ebola were vaccinated. The trial proved that the vaccine had 100% efficacy, meaning everyone who received the vaccine was protected from it.

Pam Eisele, the company’s spokesperson, vows that Meck will be “making the vaccine available to Gavi-eligible countries at the lowest possible access price.” Currently Gavi works with 40 of the 54 countries in Africa and hopes to procure the vaccine for all high-risk counties as part of a set of “Ebola response tools”.

The WHO, the United Nations agencies and Gavi hope to use this vaccine’s success to help eradicate the fatal and extremely contagious disease from the continent of Africa.