Ebola Vaccine: An Overview
Ebola hemorrhagic fever is a highly contagious disease that causes death in up to 90 percent of those infected with
Ebola virus. Furthermore, there is no
Ebola treatment that will cure the infection once it begins; therefore preventing the spread of the virus is crucial to containing
Ebola outbreaks. This is one reason why
Ebola research scientists are actively studying a possible Ebola vaccine.
At this point, there is not a licensed Ebola vaccine for humans; however, there is an Ebola vaccine that has shown to be effective in monkeys.
Based on recent research findings, a single shot of a fast-acting, experimental Ebola vaccine successfully protected monkeys from the deadly Ebola virus after only one month. If this vaccine proves to be similarly effective in humans, it may one day allow scientists to quickly contain Ebola outbreaks with ring vaccination, which is the same strategy that was successfully used in the past against
smallpox, according to a study published in
Nature.
This research has enormous public health implications, not only because it might be used to limit the
spread of Ebola virus, which continues to emerge in central Africa, but also because this vaccine strategy may be applied to other highly lethal viruses (such as the Marburg and Lassa fever viruses, and the
SARS coronavirus) that cause acute disease outbreaks and require a rapid response.
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