More than 16,000 doses of the Ervebo vaccine arrived in the Democratic Republic of Congo late Friday as the country battles its deadliest Ebola outbreak.
The latest outbreak, the 17th recorded in the DRC, was declared on May 15 but is believed to have been spreading for several weeks before its detection.
The outbreak has affected northern and eastern parts of the country, where weak state presence, limited health infrastructure and decades of armed conflict have complicated response efforts.
The World Health Organization announced on Thursday that the DRC would receive a total of 70,000 doses of the Ervebo vaccine, which is produced in Germany.
A batch of 16,250 doses was delivered to Kinshasa by plane on Friday.
Of the 70,000 doses allocated to the DRC, 20,000 are intended for a clinical trial, while 50,000 will be used for frontline and health workers, according to the WHO.
Ervebo, developed by pharmaceutical company Merck, is approved for use against the Zaire strain of the Ebola virus but not against the Bundibugyo strain currently circulating in the country.
WHO experts are yet to determine whether the vaccine provides protection against the Bundibugyo strain in humans, although early data, including animal trials, suggest it may offer some level of protection.
The DRC’s Minister of Health, Samuel Roger Kamba, said the vaccine had previously been deployed during earlier Ebola outbreaks.
The Ervebo vaccine “has already been used several times, and in particular on a very large scale during the 2018–2020 outbreak”, Kamba told journalists at Kinshasa airport.
The outbreak has so far caused 2,516 deaths among 5,290 confirmed cases, according to the latest figures released by Congolese authorities.
“It is growing exponentially,” Julien Harneis, the United Nations senior Ebola coordinator, warned on Friday.
Earlier this month, WHO vaccine experts recommended a full-scale human trial of Ervebo to determine whether the vaccine could provide cross-protection against the Bundibugyo strain.
Two vaccines specifically targeting the Bundibugyo strain are currently in clinical trial stages. One is being developed by US-based Moderna using mRNA technology, while another is being developed by Britain’s University of Oxford.
An additional candidate, the “rVSV Bundibugyo” vaccine, described by the WHO as “the most promising”, is also expected to be developed by Singapore-based Hilleman Laboratories.
Ebola is transmitted through contact with bodily fluids and causes fever. The disease has killed more than 15,000 people across Africa over the past 50 years.
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