Ebola Vaccine Field Trial Likely to Start in One Month: CDC

Centers' for Disease Control Director Tom Frieden said that CDC is in clinical trial phase of developing Ebola treatments and expressed his hope to have an Ebola vaccine field trial within a month.

WASHINGTON, January 14 (Sputnik) — The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) hopes to have an Ebola vaccine field trial within a month, CDC Director Tom Frieden said during a press conference on Tuesday.

“I hope that we’ll be in field with new tools within a month or so,” Frieden said.

CDC is in the clinical trial phase of developing Ebola treatments, Frieden said, but admitted that “vaccine work is very challenging.”

“We can’t proceed with that trial until we have the completion of the Phase I trials to determine whether the vaccines are safe, that should happen within the next one to two weeks…after that if everything goes well we’ll want to be in the field with the vaccine trial,” Frieden said.

Currently there are no Ebola vaccines that have been approved by the US Federal Drug Administration, however several vaccines around the world are in the process of being developed for treatment.

Pharmaceutical companies, including GlaxoSmithKline, NewLink Genetics, Merk and Johnson & Johnson, have committed to developing the Ebola vaccines and have begun clinical testing on its treatments.

Johnson & Johnson announced in January that the company had started the first phase of the in-human clinical trials for a preventative Ebola vaccine.

The World Health Organization (WHO) estimated that a minimum of 100,000 doses of the vaccine would be required to provide to front-line workers in the hardest hit Ebola-affected countries of Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia. Additionally, in order to cover a large-scale adult vaccination in the three countries, 12 million doses would be needed.

Prior to the in-human trials, the Ebola vaccine was reported to show full protection when tested on monkeys. A clinical trial of another Ebola vaccine however, was halted in Switzerland in December after volunteers complained of pains in their joints.

More than 8,000 people have died from Ebola since the start of the epidemic, according to the latest World Health Organization data. The United States has allocated over $400 million to help fight the Ebola outbreak.

Health Infrastructure, Funding to Prevent Next Infectious Disease Endemic

A strong domestic health infrastructure and global health security investments will help to prevent other infectious diseases, similar to Ebola from becoming an endemic, the Centers for Disease Control Director Tom Frieden said during a press conference on Tuesday.

“Keeping that [domestic Ebola response] system up and effective and using it for more than just Ebola, but other infectious diseases will be critically important,” Frieden said, adding that “the global health security dollars are a real game changer.”

Frieden added that global health security money could help to create a better warning and rapid response system to detect for early warning signs to “basically prevent it from them from becoming the next Ebola.”

Meanwhile, Frieden remained confident that the United States and international partners would help to contribute to additional Ebola funding.

”When we put in work programs that find and stop outbreaks, I believe that that will generate support from the countries themselves and from other international partners and from the US,” Frieden said.

More than 8,000 people have died from Ebola since the start of the epidemic, according to the latest World Health Organization data. The United States has allocated over $400 million to help fight the Ebola outbreak.