Ebola vaccine tested, patients isolated
Hospitals in Edmonton, Ontario send blood for analysis
Human testing of an experimental Canadianmade Ebola vaccine began Monday, while health care workers in Alberta and Ontario held patients who were showing symptoms of the virus in isolation.
The vaccine, known as VSV- EBOV, was created by scientists at the Public Health Agency of Canada’s National Microbiology Laboratory and officials say the drug could be shipped to West Africa within months if it proves successful.
The vaccine is the latest in an array of experimental weapons being developed across the world in the hope of containing the outbreak, which the World Health Organization has called “the most severe, acute health emergency seen in modern times.”
In August, Vancouver- based pharmaceutical company Tekmira announced its developmental therapeutic TKM- Ebola was OK’d by the U. S. Food and Drug Administration for potential use in individuals infected with Ebola. Mark J. Murray, the company’s president and CEO, said then that the outbreak underscored the need for a drug to treat the virus. Since that time, the estimated number of worldwide deaths from Ebola has increased 300 per cent, from 1,000 to 4,000.
Even as health officials said the Ebola virus may have crept closer to this province than ever before, they maintained their position that the risk to Canadians is low.
Patients in Edmonton, Ottawa and Belleville were each isolated then tested for the virus after they had shown symptoms of the disease, said officials.
The Ottawa patient was admitted to hospital Sunday, then released late Monday after test results came in “negative.”
Meanwhile, a patient remained in isolation in an Edmonton hospital Monday with Ebola- like symptoms.
And in Belleville, a patient was isolated within minutes of entering the city’s general hospital. His blood samples were sent to the National Microbiology Lab in Winnipeg for testing, with results expected today or Wednesday. He was in Sierra Leone recently but doctors considered it unlikely the symptoms would turn out to be Ebola, said medical health officer Dr. Richard Schabas.
“You’re going to see many instances like this over the next few weeks as health care workers and others return from the area ( West Africa),” Schabas told a news conference.
Twenty vials of Canada’s experimental vaccine have been sent to the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research in Maryland for testing on about 40 healthy volunteers, Health Minister Rona Ambrose said from Calgary.
The Phase 1 trial will determine if the vaccine is safe for human use. It will also determine proper dosage levels and test for possible side effects, Ambrose said.
Studies have shown the vaccine works in primates both to prevent infection before exposure and to increase survival chances when given quickly after exposure.
A Liberian man died from Ebola in Texas Wednesday, and it was announced Sunday that a nurse at the man’s hospital become infected with the virus while caring for him.