Ebola vaccine is safe and effective, scientists declare after trials

A vaccine for Ebola which has completed successful trials in Guinea and Sierra Leone means the virus should never again be able to wreak the havoc it did during the recent epidemic in west Africa, say scientists.

More than 11,000 people died in the outbreak, which began unnoticed in December 2013 and spread across the region, infecting at least 28,600 people and triggering a global response, including a race to get an effective vaccine tested and into use.

Final results for the vaccine that was rushed into trials in Guinea and later Sierra Leone show that it was highly effective against one of the most lethal known pathogens in existence. Ten days after vaccination, none of the trial subjects developed Ebola virus disease. The very few who did, in the days immediately following vaccination, are thought to have been infected already.

“While these compelling results come too late for those who lost their lives during west Africa’s Ebola epidemic, they show that when the next Ebola outbreak hits, we will not be defenceless,” said Dr Marie-Paule Kieny, the World Health Organisation’s assistant director general for health systems and innovation, and the study’s lead author.

Dr Marie-Paule Kieny of the WHO announces the results at the United Nations in Geneva on 22 December. Photograph: Martial Trezzini/EPA

Merck, Sharp & Dohme, the company manufacturing the vaccine, has received permission to go through fast-track procedures for a licence from the US and European regulatory authorities. It has committed to making 300,000 doses that will be ready for any emergency even before formal approval, with $ 5m (£4m) in funding from Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance.

The trial began in the coastal region of Basse-Guinée, which still had cases in 2015, even though the numbers were abating across the region. Writing in the Lancet medical journal, the scientists say it was not easy.

“A devastating outbreak of Ebola virus disease is clearly not the ideal situation for doing a vaccine trial. The healthcare system in Guinea was strained, potential trial participants were worried about a candidate vaccine made by foreign people, and the Ebola virus disease response teams were facing security issues,” they write.

They collaborated closely with the government and local authorities in Guinea and chose a “ring vaccination” design for the trial, which was unusual but had been successful in helping stamp out smallpox decades ago.

When a new case of Ebola was diagnosed, the teams offered vaccination to everybody who had been in contact with that person in the previous three weeks, from family to friends and neighbours. They also offered vaccination to the closest contacts of those contacts. This cluster – or ring – amounted to around 80 people on average. Altogether, 117 such rings or clusters were identified. At first, adults were randomly assigned to get the vaccine immediately or three weeks later, but when it became clear that the vaccine was protecting most people, everybody was offered immediate vaccination, including children.

A baby receives a vaccine in Freetown, Sierra Leone, November 2014. Photograph: Francisco Leong/AFP/Getty Images

Among the 5,837 people who received the vaccine, still known only as rVSV-ZEBOV, no Ebola cases were recorded 10 days or more after vaccination. Among those who were not vaccinated, there were 23 cases. There were very few serious side-effects – one case of fever and one of anaphylaxis (allergic reaction) thought to be related to the vaccine.

The authors of the study say the ring design was also helpful in ending the outbreak and suggest it could be a useful way to tackle the disease in future.

Co-author John Edmunds, professor of infectious disease modelling at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, whose team helped design the trial, said: “This novel and historic trial, conducted under the most difficult of circumstances, has demonstrated that the rVSV-ZEBOV vaccine is safe and effective. When Ebola strikes again we will be in a much better position to offer help to affected communities, as well as protect the brave volunteers who help control this terrible disease.”

Jeremy Farrar, director of the Wellcome Trust, which supported the trial, said the outcome was “simply remarkable” and demonstrated what was possible even in the midst of a raging epidemic.“We’ve shown that by working collaboratively, across international borders and sectors, we can develop and test vaccines rapidly and use them to help bring epidemics to an end,” he said.

“Had a vaccine been available earlier in the Ebola epidemic, thousands of lives might have been saved. We have to get ahead of the curve and make promising diagnostics, drugs and vaccines for diseases we know could be a threat in the future. My hope is that this success story provides the inspiration we need to make this happen and change the way the world prepares for epidemics.”

Dr Sakoba Kéita, coordinator of the Ebola response and director of the National Agency for Health Security in Guinea, said: “Ebola left a devastating legacy in our country. We are proud that we have been able to contribute to developing a vaccine that will prevent other nations from enduring what we endured.”

Ebola vaccine is safe and effective, scientists declare after trials

MMR vaccine: Lawyers currently being sued for pursuing declare primarily based on hyperlink to autism

Dr Andrew Wakefield arrives with wife at a Standard Health care Council hearing. He was later on struck off more than his research into the MMR (measles, mumps and rubella) jab. Photograph: Daniel Berehulak/Getty

A guy is suing his former legal team for pursuing “hopeless claims” based mostly on flawed research into the MMR vaccine, it has emerged.

Matthew McCafferty, who developed autism three years soon after getting the vaccine, is taking legal action above a legal claim that he says had no likelihood of succeeding, according to a report in the Instances (paywall).

He is suing the lawyers Hodge Jones &amp Allen for their “unjust enrichment as officers of the court by litigating a hopeless claim funded by legal aid by which you profited”.

A lot more than 1,000 families have been involved in a class action that was dropped in 2003 following research by Andrew Wakefield on the website link between autism and the MMR vaccine was discredited. He was later struck off as a medical professional for offences relating to dishonesty and failing to act in the very best interests of vulnerable little one individuals.

The lengthy group action value an estimated £15m in legal aid. Michael Shaw, McCafferty’s solicitor, explained his declare was the very first, but his firm had been in make contact with with several former MMR vaccine litigants who it believed had been entitled to compensation from former lawyers.

“The unique MMR vaccine litigation was supposed to be worth billions in compensation, not mere hundreds of thousands, but it value millions in legal aid,” Shaw advised the Occasions. “There was also a massive private price for the households involved — all the raised hopes and expectations, driven by the irresponsible media frenzy based mostly on an unsubstantiated health scare and junk science. Not a single penny in compensation was obtained for any child. The households are now just beginning to recover and get stock, they are scrutinising the actions of their former lawyers and health-related advisers.”

Shaw’s solicitor argues that Hodge Jones &amp Allen negligently handled McCafferty’s declare and missed the time limit for filing a declare, which they say was 10 years from the date of supply of the vaccine from the companies.

McCafferty, 23, from Falkirk, central Scotland, is searching for damages to “incorporate compensation, distress, cost and inconvenience of engaging in hopeless litigation”.

Hodge Jones &amp Allen denies negligence either in the timing of the issuing of proceedings or in proceeding on the obtainable proof. Its solicitors, RPC, said: “Public funding was granted to your client and there was a belief at the time that there was a causal hyperlink in between MMR vaccinations and the onset of autism. While this ‘link’ has been extensively discredited, there was absolutely no reason at all for our consumer to have deemed at the time that the declare was fully with no merit and/or was hopeless.”

MMR vaccine: Lawyers currently being sued for pursuing declare primarily based on hyperlink to autism

Nigerians due to be deported, regardless of declare of female genital mutilation threat

Website link to video: FGM: Nigerian mother’s fears for two daughters if deportation goes ahead

A mom who claimed asylum, fearing that her daughters would be subjected to female genital mutilation if they were sent back to Nigeria, is due to be deported on Thursday soon after currently being detained on Wednesday afternoon, her supporters say.

Afusat Saliu and her two daughters Basirat, three, and Rashidat, a single, have been taken into custody following unsuccessfully campaigning to be allowed to stay in the United kingdom. Afusat, herself a victim of FGM, has stated she fears her daughters will be mutilated also and, as a Christian, has spoken of her fear that they could be targeted by the Nigerian Islamic extremist group Boko Haram, which just lately kidnapped and nevertheless hold more than 200 schoolgirls.

Anj Handa, who started a petition asking the Residence Workplace to reconsider the case that has been signed by much more than 120,000 men and women, stated attorneys acting for Afusat had utilized to carry a judicial evaluation and expected the deportation to be place on hold although the case was deemed.

Nigerians due to be deported, regardless of declare of female genital mutilation threat

Scaremongering pandemic could declare a great number of lives | Dean Burnett

Even the most cursory glance at the mainstream media suggests that the modern day planet is filled with possible dangers, so much so it’s difficult to say which 1 you must be worrying about the most. Is the meals we consume killing us? Is our climate also cold, or also hot? Are we going to be beneath attack from giant snakes, rats, or jellyfish? Or are terrorists the largest threat? Or the return of the plague? Or perhaps screens are gradually corrupting us all? Or mobile phones? There are several other prospects.

Nonetheless, recent findings recommend that accurate response might be more insidious the largest threat to humanity these days could be scaremongering.

A lately published research by the Division of Impending Apocalypse Studies at Doomsday University, Milton Keynes, has produced alarming final results suggesting that scaremongering could threaten all daily life on Earth, as properly as any microbes on Mars or Europa.

Professor Mortis, head of the examine, claimed to be as amazed by the final results as anyone.

“I wanted to uncover out what the largest risk to mankind was, and I assumed it would be one thing predictable like asteroids or wasps, but all our information points in the direction of scaremongering as the factor that is going to kill us all. Almost certainly quite painfully, as nicely. And slowly”.

Professor Mortis, acknowledged just as “Mort” to those who work with him, expects the scientific community to resist his findings, but insists that they are correct.

“Others in the area will no doubt accuse me of exaggerating the dangers, overstating the threat, emphasising the damaging outcomes or … whatever else you’d call that, of scaremongering. But the information speaks for itself.”

In order to gather the data, Professor Mortis sent many teams of his postdocs and PhD students (whom he affectionately refers to as “Les Petits Morts”) out into the common population to a lot of regions representing different levels of affluence, ethnicity, economic make-up and so forth, to gather information on what individuals felt the largest risk facing society was.

“We got a extremely broad variety of answers, such as vaccines, the illuminati and video games, but following some extreme aspect analysis, it was fairly clear that the major common element of all of these was scaremongering.”

Scaremongering has been known to have direct results on people’s health. For instance, persistent scaremongering can induce substantial states of anxiousness and acute stress, which can have detrimental bodily effects, allow alone the psychological impact, all of which impairs standard working and overall health. But Professor Mortis argues that the a lot more lethal effects of scaremongering are a lot more indirect.

“The impacts on well being of scaremongering are one factor, but it influences behaviour in other techniques that are even much more devastating. The drop in vaccination amounts, the Iraq war and its consequences, discrediting overall health companies, the demonising of minorities foremost to elevated social tensions and prejudice all of these and a lot more involve scaremongering to a extremely true degree, and all can demonstrate quite fatal to many, a lot of individuals.”

The issue is even worse than that, Professor Mortis gloomily points out, as scaremongering is very varied and difficult to deal with.

“Not only does it have all these damaging consequences, scaremongering is a master of misdirection, so can hamper any attempt to deal with said unfavorable consequences. Climate change, antibiotic resistance these are really genuine threats which need to be dealt with ASAP, but folks who don’t want to believe this just dismiss them as scaremongering, when they are something but! Scaremongering is so damn devious, and you can’t even punch it in its smug evil face because it does not have one particular, what with being an abstract notion and all.”

In fact, scaremongering is so vague and poorly understood as a scientific entity, Professor Mortis has had to devise his own method for recording it. Utilizing Professor Mortis’s system, scaremongering is measured in units known as “Greenfields”, soon after a particularly frequent scientific source.

“Say your partner sees a little spider in the bathtub and then tells you it was the dimension of a dinner plate, that’s just 4 or five milliGreenfields of scaremongering. But politicians claiming that a referendum could lead to terrorist attacks? That’s a number of hundred Greenfields, there.”

Politics and media organisations with political agendas are a particularly rich source of scaremongering, with US election campaigns and the Day-to-day Express in distinct frequently obtaining an output measured in megaGreenfields.

“Keeping individuals frightened is an efficient way of controlling them, so it’s no wonder politicians and their media close friends are neck-deep in scaremongering” Professor Mortis adds.

There are, as predicted, other scientific authorities who disagree with Professor Mortis’s claims, citing the fact that numerous individuals take pleasure in currently being frightened, and the fact that several news stories, specially relating to wellness and medication, frequently emphasise the positives and downplay the negatives, which numerous could argue as in fact getting more hazardous when it comes to creating informed choices. They also say that scaremongering may be a consequence rather than a trigger of considerably of what threatens people in the present day era.

Even so, Professor Mortis is dismissive of such views.

“My information speaks for itself, you won’t uncover any flaws in my investigation and analysis. I’m recognized for it. You start seeking for numerous different interpretations and you really do not know in which you will finish up. Me, I’m all about the rigour. My colleagues say I’m too rigid, as well stiff, that “you’re all about the rigour, Mortis”, but I stand by my work.

“The bottom line is, the dangers of scaremongering cannot be overstated.”

The earliest recorded illustration of scaremongering dates from all around forty,000 years in the past and is found in the Cave of El Castillo. Amid the popular paintings are some of predators that, professionals say, are obviously considerably greater than they would have been in the wild.

“Some palaeolithic bloke was most likely striving to place the wind up his tribe mates. Cynical sod” stated an archaeologist.

Professor Mortis was unavailable for comment on this, as he had sealed himself in an underground bunker with 400 cans of beans and a shotgun.

Dean Burnett generally tries to downplay the dangers of everything, as a result accelerating mankind’s inevitable demise, via Twitter @garwboy

Scaremongering pandemic could declare a great number of lives | Dean Burnett

Sahel meningitis outbreaks linked to wind and dust ranges, declare scientists

A donkey throws up dust in Chad’s Mao area. Research suggests wind and dust levels can be employed to predict meningitis. Photograph: Rebecca Blackwell/AP

Scientists could soon be in a position to forecast ailment outbreaks in sub-Saharan African’s “meningitis belt” using climate information. The forecasts could be used to strategy early vaccination drives aimed at preventing or limiting casualties.

In the “meningitis belt” of sub-Saharan Africa, which stretches across the Sahel from Senegal to Ethiopia, major epidemics of lethal meningitis are schedule. A devastating 1996-97 outbreak killed about 25,000 individuals.

An powerful new vaccine has driven a decrease in meningitis, but the common method in the area has been to carry out vaccination drives and antibiotic therapy of the condition in districts previously struggling outbreaks. In some cases, assist arrives as well late to make a substantial influence, overall health officials say.

In the close to future, although, scientists may well be ready to use climate factors this kind of as wind and dust circumstances to forecast these epidemics and develop earlier vaccination methods to prevent or limit casualties.

New research carried out in Niger by the Nasa Goddard Institute for Room Research and Columbia University’s Global Study Institute for Climate and Society found that measured amounts of wind and dust can be utilised to predict some of the yearly variability in meningitis outbreaks, at both nationwide and district levels.

“We’ve recognized that the disease is associated to climate and environmental problems for a extended time, due to the fact it really is quite seasonal,” explained Carlos Pérez García-Pando, one of the report’s lead authors.

The challenge, he said, was to figure out which climate factors have been essential in buy to greater equip public wellness selection-makers to act.

“The idea was to try to use designs and observations from satellites and all kinds of data on possible (climate-connected) parameters that might be affecting the ailment, and consider to use that data to provide advance warning,” Pérez said.

What the group of researchers found was a notably shut correlation in between wind and dust levels and meningitis outbreaks.

Madeleine Thomson, another researcher concerned in the task, named the strength of the romantic relationship astonishing.

“A lot of professionals have known for a prolonged time that setting is crucial, but not how important,” she stated.

The analysis on meningitis follows equivalent perform with malaria, connecting climate aspects to the mosquito-borne condition.

Thomson explained that the distinctions in between the two illnesses produced them effectively-suited for comparative scientific studies.

“We had some experience working on malaria, and chose to function on meningitis, because it truly is an essential ailment, specifically for the Sahel area in Africa, and it is a dry season condition, as an alternative of a moist season ailment … So it permitted us to investigate some of the issues of dealing with a diverse sort of the condition, but again with environmental and climate elements.”

“What we have realized is that yes, this strategy can be utilized to climate sensitive illnesses, writ huge,” she said.

The researchers stated their operate was made to assist wellness officials make successful decisions about meningitis vaccination campaigns. “We have been collaborating extremely closely with decision makers,” extra Pérez.

The following actions are to increase the investigation outdoors of Niger and build models for other elements of the affected area, he explained.

“What we’ve developed is a valuable tool that can assist selection makers to think, organise, distribute medicine, and make their choices much more in advance,” Pérez said.

Sahel meningitis outbreaks linked to wind and dust ranges, declare scientists

We"ve cracked how to overcome nut allergic reactions, declare scientists

Researchers at the Wellcome Trust Clinical investigation facility at Addenbrooke’s Hospital, Cambridge, gave 99 youngsters aged amongst 7 and sixteen a sample of peanut protein in powder form. They increased the dosage in excess of six months until the youngsters had been in a position to consume a complete nut without having any adverse reactions.

Dr Andrew Clark and Dr Pamela Ewan hope the remedy will soon be obtainable on the NHS.

Dr Clark stated: “This is a genuine very first. Peanut allergies affect a single million people in the United kingdom. We have a massive investigation group and we have been functioning on this for about twenty years.

“So several men and women have this allergy and there are a quantity of deaths across the United kingdom each yr. Hopefully we can use this treatment method in the NHS now.”

One particular volunteer, Lena Barden, 11, of Histon, Cambs, mentioned: “I was nervous at initial. I hated peanuts. They’re disgusting and weird. But I was curious about what they tasted like.

“Last year I had my 1st doughnut, with traces of nuts, and it tasted wonderful. I truly feel so much much more safe.”

The results of the greatest single trial of its variety worldwide are published in The Lancet on Thursday.

Edited by Andrew Marszal

We"ve cracked how to overcome nut allergic reactions, declare scientists