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Uganda Has Yet to Get Ebola Vaccine for Trials Amid Raging Epidemic, Health Ministry Says

© AP Photo / Hajarah NalwaddaMedical workers walk inside the Ebola isolation center of Madudu Health Center III, in the village of Madudu, in the Mubende district of Uganda Tuesday, Nov. 1, 2022.
Medical workers walk inside the Ebola isolation center of Madudu Health Center III, in the village of Madudu, in the Mubende district of Uganda Tuesday, Nov. 1, 2022. - Sputnik International, 1920, 05.11.2022
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On Thursday, the East African nation's authorities reported that there have been 131 confirmed infections and 48 confirmed deaths due to the Ebola outbreak, with more than 2,000 contacts of confirmed cases being tracked down or kept under observation.
The authorities of Uganda have not received Ebola candidate vaccines for patient trials, and international organizations have not yet provided tentative delivery dates, the country's Health Ministry spokesman Emmanuel Ainebyona said.
According to the spokesman, the World Health Organization (WHO), the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI), and the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization (GAVI) do not yet have a tentative date for when the Ugandan government will receive the vaccines the organizations pledged to provide.

“Once they are here, we shall start the clinical trial,” Ainebyona is quoted as saying by the local media.

The promise to provide the experimental vaccines for Ugandan frontline medical staff was reportedly made over three weeks ago.
in a joint statement earlier this week, Uganda's Ministry of Health, CEPI, GAVI, and the WHO said they had developed a strategy to speed up research during the current outbreak to ensure access to investigational doses, to ease scaling up, and increase the availability of any subsequently licensed vaccine.
The healthcare authorities are expected to assess the effectiveness of three potential vaccines for the Sudan strain of Ebola, prevalent in Uganda, by choosing the trial vaccines from the UK's Oxford Institute as well as the US companies Sabin and Merck.
Within a 29-day target, the key goal is to assess how well they can protect the primary contacts of Ebola patients.
Health workers stand at a non-gazetted crossing point in the Mirami village, near the Mpondwe border check point between Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo  - Sputnik International, 1920, 16.10.2022
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Nearly One Million Quarantined in Uganda as Ebola Outbreak Spreads
However, while the trials drag on, and the number of new Ebola cases rises, the ministry has complained about not having enough money to effectively track down contacts, treat cases, and maintain surveillance in regions that have already been designated as high risk. One of the reasons for the lack of funding is said to be the lengthy procedure for transferring funds through international organizations and foundations.
Dr. Ahmed Ogwell, acting director of the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said last week that the Ebola outbreak in Uganda is under control and that local health authorities are doing a good job of tracing the majority of contacts.
Furthermore, last month, Ugandan state Communication Minister Godfrey Kabbyanga said that the Ebola epidemic was “coming under control” and expressed hope it would be “wiped out by the close of 2022.”
The Ebola virus that is spreading in Uganda is the Sudan strain, which is less prevalent in Africa in general than the Zaire strain. There is currently no vaccine that has been proven effective. Ebola treatments are still being developed, and vaccination is seen to be the most effective way to stop Ebola epidemics.
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