Ebola virus a threat to great ape populations
The Ebola virus causes epidemics that wreak havoc in some tropical forest areas in Central Africa. Its control is therefore a major public health priority. The virus, transmitted to humans mainly by carcasses of gorillas, chimpanzees and duikers (Bovidae), provokes haemorrhagic fever which is usually fatal. IRD researchers and co-workers from partner organizations (1) have just shown that these a...The first human trial of a vaccine designed to prevent Ebola infection opened today. Scientists from the Vaccine Research Center (VRC) at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), one of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), designed the vaccine, which was administered to a volunteer at the NIH Clinical Center in Bethesda. The vaccine does not contain any infectious ma...A single shot of a fast-acting, experimental Ebola vaccine successfully protects monkeys from the deadly virus after only one month. If this vaccine proves similarly effective in humans, it may one day allow scientists to quickly contain Ebola outbreaks with ring vaccination--the same strategy successfully used in the past against smallpox, according to a study published in this week's issue of...