Ebola vaccine drive launched in DRC as number of cases rise to 49

Seth Berkley, Gavi’s chief executive officer, in the DRC today to see the launch of the campaign, said in a statement, “The DRC government, alongside the WHO, MSF [Doctors Without Borders] and others, are working hard to slow the spread of Ebola. We now hope that deploying the vaccine will give a vital boost to these efforts, helping to defeat this outbreak.”

Of the WHO vaccine stock, 7,540 doses are slated for the DRC, enough for 50 rings of 150 people. Contacts and contacts of contacts are slated for voluntary vaccine, and health workers will regularly monitor those who are vaccinated. Frontline response workers will also be offered the vaccine, as will be health workers and responder in countries at risk for spread of the disease. An extra 8,000 doses will be available in the coming days.

Health teams with experience in Ebola vaccination from Guinea arrived in the DRC over the weekend to help with the DRC’s campaign. The WHO said the ring vaccination strategy depends on tracing all contact and contacts of contacts as soon as possible after a case is confirmed. So far, more than 600 contacts have been identified, the WHO said.

The Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) said yesterday that it has recruited 25 epidemiologists to support teams working in the affected areas of the DRC.

The WHO said each vaccination team has one or two social mobilizers who will visit the community and explain the process to people who are eligible for vaccination. It also emphasized that although the use of the vaccine marks a milestone for controlling the disease, it is just one of several outbreak control steps, such as case finding, contact tracing, isolating sick patients, lab testing, infection control, and safe burials.

New cases lift outbreak total to 49

Salama today said the Ebola case total has grown by 4 more cases over the weekend, to 49 cases, reflecting 22 confirmed, 21 probable, and 6 suspected cases.

One more death has been reported in the outbreak, involving a nurse in Bikoro where the outbreak is centered, the Associated Press (AP) reported today, citing the DRC’s health minister, Oly Ilunga.

So far it’s not clear where the new cases are from, but health officials are worried about spread in Mbandaka, which  has a population of 1.2 million, where four cases had been reported by the end of last week. Salama said in a May 19 tweet that three cases from Wangata health zone in Mbandaka were confirmed and that the fourth is a new suspected case that’s not linked to the others.

A report from The Atlantic said inaccurate maps are stirring some confusion about the boundaries of the Wangata health zone where the Mbandaka patients are from.

So far, there’s no evidence that the map problems are hurting the response, Cyrus Cinai, a cartographer from the University of California at Los Angeles who is working with the health ministry to improve map accuracy, told The Atlantic. Health officials in the DRC, however, said it’s important to have good visualizations to communicate conditions on the ground to international partners who don’t know the area and to get a clear grasp on where the outbreak is and how it’s moving.

Support grows for outbreak response
Canada’s government on 19 May announced that it will provide an additional $2.5 million in emergency humanitarian assistance to help support organizations responding to the outbreak.

Marie-Claude Bibeau, minister of international development, said in a statement, “Preventing further transmission of the Ebola virus is essential to controlling the current outbreak. This emergency funding will go directly to trusted humanitarian partners and enable health care workers and response teams to continue to quickly manage this outbreak.”

Meanwhile, the Washington Post reported on 18 May that the United States is planning to provide several million dollars to support the DRC’s Ebola outbreak, with details being finalized and an announcement expected early this week.

The WHO has said it and its partners need $26 million for the Ebola response over the next three months.