The trial was started by the Public Health Agency of Canada and then developed by the pharmaceutical company Merck.
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A vaccine against the deadly Ebola virus has been shown to be 100 percent successful in trials conducted in Guinea.
Scientists believe the vaccine is most effective at the onset of an outbreak and plan to expand the vaccination to minors age 13 and older.
A Canadian vaccine has become the first effective defense against the deadly disease Ebola, Canadian media reported Friday.
The Guinea trial – called “Ebola, ça suffit” in French (‘Ebola, that’s enough’) – tested a ring vaccination design, a strategy that was borrowed from successful smallpox eradication efforts in the 1970s.
When a first Ebola case occurred in a village, researchers vaccinated everyone in contact with the sick person. They received the vaccine immediately or three weeks after being known to have an Ebola patient in their social circle.
He remained concerned that if people think the vaccine works they will no longer think help is needed, even though measles-which can be prevented with a vaccine-also kills far more than Ebola.
At least 10 days after randomization, there were no new cases detected among those who were immediately vaccinated, compared with 16 confirmed cases in individuals who delayed vaccination, according to the researchers.
The traditional “gold standard” for testing a new drug would vaccinate half of a population at risk of contracting Ebola, while giving other people in the virus zone a placebo.
The results have been hailed as “extremely promising” by World Health Organisation chief Margaret Chan. “This (vaccine) could be the key that we’ve been missing to end the outbreak”, said University of Reading virologist Ben Neuman, who was not involved in the study. Since last year, more than 11,000 people in West Africa have died from the virus.
The decision to start the trial was taken in October, but it didn’t get off the ground until March.
Dr. Andrew Simor, chief of microbiology and infectious diseases at Sunnybrook Hospital in Toronto, was in Sierra Leone in January training Ebola fighting teams and he told CBC that the vaccine is truly a game changer.
An all-out search for a vaccine was launched after a widespread Ebola outbreak hit West Africa.
A health worker injects a woman with an anti-Ebola vaccine during a trial in Monrovia on February 2, 2015.
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About 28,000 people have been infected in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia since late 2013, according to the WHO, and is the worst Ebola outbreak in history. The vaccine is made by Merck and was tested in Guinea. The vaccine will also be tested on frontline workers.
