UK scientists developing new Ebola vaccine that could be ready in months(bbc.co.uk)

bbc.co.uk

UK scientists developing new Ebola vaccine that could be ready in months

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cy82gkr7xzlo

1 comments

Interesting move, but from my perspective, ring vaccination only works if you can find the rings. Most contact tracing in eastern DRC still runs on paper, with names probably misspelt, some records lost and other issues that come with manual workflows. And this is something we see every time as wee go over digitising legacy records at Pisgah across African health facilities.

No doubt, a vaccine in 2–3 months is incredible, but still, the clinical record layer to actually deploy it is the part nobody's funding or having conversations about. If I recall correctly, Bundibugyo hasn't been seen for over a decade, which implies that frontline staff are pattern-matching from memory, not records and even if there are records, it's definitely scanty.

Over the years, we keep building the visible half of the response and ignoring the half underneath it. Not sure how much of the 2007 Uganda and the 2012 DRC was documented digitally, but well, I just had to put it out there.