DRC: Experimental Ebola Vaccine to be Administered in Mbandaka
Original article from The Guardian by Jason Burke May 20, 2018
Health authorities and NGOs in the Democratic Republic of the Congo will begin administering an experimental Ebola vaccine on Monday in Mbandaka, the north-western city of 1.2 million people where the deadly disease was detected last week.
The campaign aims to “ringfence” the outbreak. The risk of Ebola spreading within DRC is very high and the disease could move into nine neighbouring countries, the World Health Organization has said.
The death toll has risen to 26, with one new fatality and three new suspected cases declared on Saturday evening. Only one of these was in Mbandaka, raising hopes that the spread of the often lethal and highly contagious disease in the city could be contained. Forty-six people are now known to have been infected.
Oly Ilunga, the country’s minister of health, said the vaccine would initially target “the health staff, the contacts of the sick and the contacts of the contacts,” amounting to about 600 people.