Amid the Ebola threat, Liberians gradually started to regain their normal lives as the number of the infected is getting lesser this time.
Reportedly, there were just around five people to have infected from Ebola virus. West Africa is now regaining the normal lives they have had before. Possible reasons were determined like the discovery of the Ebola vaccines from different experts. One of those reported is from Dr. Nancy Sullivan.
Sullivan's discovery to the experimented vaccine to treat Ebola victims was used to vaccinate the people in West Africa together with the vaccine made by the Canadian government. These two vaccines will be used for a large-scale testing in the Liberian region. Thus, volunteers had lead the way to conduct the said testing last week.
SF Gate cited that after several experimental shots, she is now hoping that this time's tests, the vaccines are now effective and will treat the infected as volunteers tested them to the Liberians a week ago.
Wessedi Sio Njoh, the Director of Operations with the Partnership for Ebola Vaccination, told Deutsche Welle that the testing was done last February 2 at the crowded hospital in New Kru Town where they tested around twelve people. "Twelve persons for today and hopefully the number will increase as we go along," he quoted. This town is also considered the most densely populated area surrounded by poor shanty community.
The vaccines, though hoped to have good results, gave some side effects to the patients like headaches, pain at the injected area, fever, and some joint pains. Assistant Health Minister Tolbert Nyenswah said, "There are some side effects like headache and vomiting. It is like any other drug with side effects. 400 people have taken this vaccine; some in the United States and others in Europe and Mali and we have not heard about any death among them."
Currently, Sullivan is now hoping that after her series of tests, this time, these vaccines will finally work.
On the other side, there was an existing dramatic decrease of the number of victims from the past few months. However, the health officials wished that the virus will be gone out at least before rainy season fearing that it would increase numbers of victims again.
Dr. Bruce Aylward of the World Health Organization doubted that these vaccine shots will really work but still hoping that they will give them the real data they needed. Dr. Sullivan defended herself from series of failures upon discovering vaccines that would really be effective.
"You need a failure to know what immune responses aren't helpful, as difficult as they were at the time," Sullivan said.
Volunteers who took part in this experiment initially doubted with the possible outcome. Amid these fears, there were around six hundred volunteers who took the vaccine as confirmed by the National Institute of Clinical Director Clifford Lane.
He said that these procedures had already undergone through reviews for scientific rigor and ethics. Front Page Africa cited that in total, there were already around 27, 000 healthy adult volunteers who participated with this large-scale study and research.
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