Ebola slows down, vaccine development promising

BEIJING - The World Health Organization (WHO) said the Ebola outbreaks was slowing down as measures were being enforced and some technical targets were almost reached, while scientists said their development of anti-Ebola vaccines is generating promising results.

WHO Assistant Director-General Bruce Aylward told a press conference in Geneva on Monday that the Ebola outbreaks is slowing down as the affected West Africa countries have largely reached the 70 percent target of safe burials, case isolation and treatment.

Given the increasing gap between the rapid rise of the disease and the capacity to treat it, WHO and the UN Mission for Ebola Emergency Response set the target of the so-called "70-70-60 plan", which tried to get 70 percent of the cases isolated and treated, and 70 percent of the deceased safely buried within 60 days from the beginning of October to Dec. 1.

Aylward said two months ago the deadly disease is escalating in many places and exponential growth was seen in term of new cases, due to the shortage of treatment beds as well as burial teams.

Aylward, who is in charge of WHO's response to Ebola outbreaks, updated that in all the three countries, more than 70 percent of the Ebola deaths are buried safely as the numbers of safe burial teams have more than doubled over the past 60 days, from less than 100 to nearly 200.

In terms of the percentage of cases treated in the Ebola treatment center or community care center, he said that Liberia and Guinea are currently treating more than 70 percent of the reported cases, and Sierra Leone is expected to meet the target in the coming weeks with planned additional beds capacity being rolled out.

Meanwhile, he also noted the numbers of available Ebola treatment beds largely doubled across the three heavily-affected countries, and Sierra Leone witnessed the greatest increase from about 267 in late September to almost 650 on Dec. 1, and Liberia from 480 to near 1,000.

"Yes, we are on track because the disease is slowing down with the 70 percent achievement to stop Ebola," he said, hailing this reached an important milestone along the way.

"The step-up both in safe burials and in proportion of cases being isolated is reflected in the epidemiology, as you see, there has a real slow down in the speed of new cases, fortunately in most areas across the West Africa," he added.

"We were no longer seeing exponential growth and in some areas we were seen declining disease," He said.

However, he noted the disease is still increasing in some hotspot areas. and in order to further stop the outbreaks, he said, more assistance is needed, including 1.55 billion U.S. dollars in the immediate response period.

Meanwhile, scientists said on Monday that their development of anti-Ebola vaccines is generating promising results.

Two Ebola vaccines undergoing clinical trials have shown promising results and would be deployed in January 2015 to West African countries affected by the epidemic, a scientist from Oxford University said Monday

Speaking at a conference of African Immunologists in Nairobi, Adrian Hill, director of Oxford University's Jenner Institute, said the two vaccines will re-energize the fight against Ebola.

"The two vaccines have demonstrated remarkable efficacy and have no side effects to Ebola patients. We anticipate their deployment will commence in January," Hill told African medical researchers.

The WHO on Saturday revealed that 6,928 people have died of Ebola in Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone.

At the same time, 16,000 people infected with the Ebola virus could succumb to death in the absence of proper treatment and care.

Pharmaceutical giants, rich governments, foundations and multilateral agencies have contributed funds to support the development of an Ebola vaccine.

Hill said that clinical trials on Ebola vaccine have accelerated thanks to adequate funding and political attention.

"Development of an Ebola vaccine is accelerating faster than anticipated. The vaccine is being tested in Mali where 80 people have received the jab," Hill said, adding that over 200 people have been vaccinated against Ebola globally.

The clinical trials on Ebola vaccine commenced in September and the WHO will approve it once it passes efficacy and safety test.

He emphasized the vaccine will be a game changer in the war against Ebola in West and Central Africa.

"The vaccine will be availed to high risk groups like health workers and people involved in burials," Hill said.

Despite the slowdown as the WHO has pointed out and the progress in anti-Ebola vaccine development, efforts against Ebola continue worldwide.

Tanzanian health authorities on Monday called on eastern African countries to strengthen cross border surveillance of the deadly Ebola virus.

Donald Mmbando, permanent secretary of Tanzania's Health and Social Welfare Ministry, said health experts in the region should ensure that the disease did not find its way into the region which has had a heavy burden of HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria.

"No outbreak of Ebola has been reported in East Africa but three months ago there were reports of Marburg disease which resembles Ebola in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC)," he said when opening the annual meeting of the Arusha-based East, Central and Southern Africa Health Community (ECSA-HC).

In October, the East African Community announced it was mobilizing 750,000 U.S. dollars from its reserve fund for emergency preparedness against Ebola.

The bloc also announced it was deploying 600 health workers to Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.