The United States has backed efforts to develop a vaccine for Ebola, but specialists said scientists must look into a number of areas in pursuing defenses against the potential bioterrorism agent, The Lancet reported last week (seeGSN, Jan. 21).
| image courtesy biologynews.net |
Weaponizing the Ebola virus appears to be a daunting task, the magazine said; the virus dies rapidly when exposed to sunlight, and the high speed with which it kills carriers minimizes opportunities for its spread.
Still, the Defense Department has provided $291 million for the development of two potential countermeasures for the Ebola and Marburg viruses at the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases at Ft. Detrick, Md. Each of the highly lethal agents causes hemorrhagic fever in humans.
“There have been quite a few promising vaccine candidates in post-exposure treatment strategies that have successfully protected nonhuman primates,” said Thomas Geisbert, an expert with the University of Texas at Austin who led a research group that determined one such treatment was 100 percent effective in animal testing. A vaccine would be useful to laboratory personnel and to medical workers in areas where the virus exists in nature, according to the magazine. Read more
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