Ebola outbreak Uganda

2022 - 10 - 7

Post cover — Image courtesy of "Nature.com"

Ebola outbreak in Uganda: how worried are researchers? (Nature.com)

The outbreak has already spread to five districts, and there are no proven vaccines for this species of the virus.

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced on 6 October that the United States will redirect travellers coming from Uganda to one of five US airports that are able to screen for the virus. Braka urges countries bordering Uganda to have Ebola test kits ready to distribute and ramp up surveillance for the virus. These should be prioritized for hospital workers, including health-care personnel who are interacting with people who have been infected and their direct contacts, and the contacts of those contacts, says Gary Kobinger, a virologist at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston who specializes in Ebola. The one that is furthest along is a single-dose vaccine that was developed in part by the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) in Bethesda, Maryland and is licensed to the Sabin Vaccine Institute in Washington DC. The good news is that clinical trials for these experimental vaccines and treatments are being organized at a breakneck pace, Kobinger says. But similar therapies for Sudan ebolavirus — responsible for the current outbreak in Uganda — are still in clinical trials. Three vaccines have undergone early tests to ensure that they are safe in humans, but the larger trials needed to confirm efficacy haven’t been possible. The rapid rise and spread of the lethal virus across five districts in Uganda have alarmed scientists, and raised fears that the outbreak will not be easy to contain. There are currently six candidates in the pipeline. So the country is familiar with the rapid-response measures needed to contain the virus, Braka says. The situation is serious, says Fiona Braka, an emergency-response programme manager at the World Health Organization Regional Office for Africa in Brazzaville, Republic of the Congo. Ebola is a rare and deadly disease — with a death rate that has ranged from 25% to 90% in past outbreaks.

Stopping The Uganda Ebola Outbreak Now Should Be A Global ... (Forbes)

Ebola is a contagious virus that sometimes spills over into human populations from animals. Because it is not as contagious as many respiratory pathogens such ...

A regional epidemic, such as the 2014-2106 epidemic in West Africa, is not out of the question, however. Vaccines have played an important role in containing recent Ebola outbreaks, but are useless against the current one, which is caused by the Sudan variant. I’m a scientist. Whatever aid Uganda requires to get the current outbreak under control will no doubt be well worth the investment. Another concern is how dispersed the known cases are. Ebola is a contagious virus that sometimes spills over into human populations from animals.

What we know about the unfolding Ebola outbreak in Uganda (Axios)

There are no approved vaccines yet for the "relatively rare" strain causing the outbreak.

Embassy in Uganda [said Thursday](https://ug.usembassy.gov/health-alert-enhanced-screening-at-designated-u-s-airports-u-s-embassy-kampala-uganda-october-6-2022/). [Doctors Without Borders](https://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/latest/uganda-four-things-know-about-ebola-outbreak)/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) has established a 36-bed Ebola treatment unit at the Mubende hospital in Uganda and is setting up another unit in Madudu. [Ugandan health authorities](https://www.afro.who.int/countries/uganda/news/uganda-declares-ebola-virus-disease-outbreak) declared the Ebola outbreak on Sept. [WHO](https://www.who.int/emergencies/disease-outbreak-news/item/2022-DON410)said there have been a number of community deaths in Madudu, which has been labeled as the ["epicenter." - "Public health responders from outside West Africa were themselves hampered by stigmatization," researchers at York University in Toronto, Canada, wrote in 2015. [six-week abortion ban](https://www.axios.com/2022/09/14/ohio-abortion-ban-blocked). [statement](https://news.un.org/en/story/2022/09/1127181). [Ebola virus](https://www.axios.com/2022/09/20/ebola-outbreak-uganda-sudan-strain), the U.S. On average, symptoms arrive between eight and 10 days after. [STAT News](https://www.statnews.com/2022/09/29/ebola-experimental-vaccine-trial-may-begin-soon-in-uganda/). Embassy in Uganda [UN](https://news.un.org/en/story/2022/09/1127181)said.

What we need to do about Uganda's Ebola outbreak should have ... (Quartz)

Only by investing in the health systems of poor countries we can protect the world from deadly outbreaks.

[rest of the world](https://qz.com/275101/am-i-safe-is-the-wrong-ebola-question-to-ask/). Other rich countries don’t have the resources of the US, but many also fell short of their commitments to support local health systems [outside their own borders](https://www.statnews.com/2021/11/12/isolated-in-uganda-covid-19-evacuations-highlights-unfairness-global-health-partnerships/). [been calling for this](https://qz.com/601246/the-zika-epidemic-shows-were-still-underrating-the-threat-posed-by-global-pandemics/). But it should call for health investments in the region (beyond the specific areas where this crisis is occurring) regardless of how the spread progresses. A [czar was named](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-ebola-usa-klain/in-ebola-response-obamas-czar-stays-behind-the-curtain-idUSKBN0IH2HW20141028). The United Nations goal of strengthening poor countries’ capacity to handle health is [far from reach](https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/ihr-core-capacity-index-sdgs?time=earliest..2020). The administration later developed a [pandemic preparedness plan](https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2020/05/trump-obama-coronavirus-pandemic-response). The UK, too, is watching the situation, though it still [considers it low-risk](https://twitter.com/sneweyy/status/1578064716848680972) and is not screening travelers. As we have seen with covid, [zika](https://qz.com/601246/the-zika-epidemic-shows-were-still-underrating-the-threat-posed-by-global-pandemics/), and monkeypox, there is no safety in trying to contain a virus in one country, or geographic area. [no vaccines or treatments](https://www.who.int/emergencies/disease-outbreak-news/item/2022-DON410) for the rare Sudan strain of virus, which is causing the outbreak. In only a few days, the case count has already made it among the [biggest Ebola outbreaks](https://twitter.com/HelenBranswell/status/1577099104056119301) in history. But this is the type of intervention that needs to be carried on after the immediate crises has ended, when the extra funding can be allocated toward infrastructure, personnel, training.

Why this Ebola outbreak in Uganda might be more worrisome than ... (Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists)

The death toll from the highly lethal virus has grown to perhaps 30 people since the first confirmed case in early September, when a man fell ill in the Mubende ...

[who recovered](https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/nejmp1501355) from Ebola in 2014 [wrote](https://twitter.com/Craig_A_Spencer/status/1578094898175246337) on Twitter Thursday. That may stop Ebola from reaching the United States, but some say more international resources are needed in Uganda. The West African Ebola outbreak primarily affected Guinea, Sierra Leone, and Liberia, but the disease turned up in several other countries, including the United States. Still, though, officials say that the country needs more help, as the outbreak continues to spread. Unlike the strain of the virus that killed more than 11,000 people between 2014 and 2016 in several West African countries, the so-called Sudan strain causing the Ugandan outbreak has no approved vaccines or treatments. The death toll from the highly lethal virus has grown to perhaps 30 people since the first confirmed case in early September, when a man fell ill in the Mubende district in central Uganda.

U.S. begins screening travelers from Uganda as precaution against ... (American Hospital Association)

As a precaution in response to the recent Ebola outbreak in Uganda, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Department of Homeland Security ...

Embassy in Uganda “To date in this outbreak, cases have only been confirmed in Uganda and no suspected, probable, or confirmed cases of Ebola have been reported in the United States, and the risk of Ebola domestically is currently low,” the embassy said. As a precaution in response to the recent Ebola outbreak in Uganda, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Department of Homeland Security Customs and Border Protection today began routing airline passengers destined for the United States who have been in Uganda within the previous 21 days to one of five airports for enhanced screening, the U.S.