Research Roundup: Global Fund replenishment, FDA allows marketing of first rapid Ebola test, and NIH to launch influenza vaccine research centers

Interested in more global health innovation news? Every week GHTC scours media reports worldwide to deliver essential global health R&D news and content to your inbox. Sign-up now to receive our weekly R&D News Roundup email. An Ebola vaccine developed by Merck & Co was approved by European regulators on Friday in a move hailed as a “triumph for public health” by the World Health Organization (WHO). The vaccine, which protects against the Zaire strain of the Ebola virus—the one that most commonly causes outbreaks—, is being used on an emergency basis during the current outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The regulators recommended conditional marketing authorization for the vaccine, which the European Commission is likely to affirm in the coming weeks, granting full marketing authorization to all member states under its purview. The vaccine is also under review by the US Food and Drug Administration using a fast-track pathway, with a decision expected in the first quarter of next year. Last week, WHO released its 2019 Global Tuberculosis Report which highlights several new technologies in the pipeline to diagnose and treat tuberculosis (TB), including a promising vaccine that could prevent people with latent TB from developing the disease. The report cites that the vaccine is one of 23 drugs, combination regimens, and vaccine candidates currently in clinical trials. Though funding for TB research and development reached US$772 million in 2017, it remains well below the target of $2 billion annually agreed to by United Nations member states at the High-Level Meeting on TB in 2018. Researchers in Brazil have identified a new parasitic disease that causes severe damage to the liver, spleen, and skin and is believed to have infected more than 150 people and caused two deaths in a northeast region of the country. The disease displays similar symptoms to two forms of leishmaniasis–a neglected tropical disease spread by infected female sandflies that attacks both the skin and internal organs. However, this new disease, which is caused by the Cridia sergipensis parasite, does not appear to respond to conventional treatments for leishmaniasis. A researcher involved in the journal article identifying this new disease emphasized the need for further research. “This is the first warning. We still need to diagnose where this parasite is located, what the vectors are, how it is transmitted, and develop an effective medicine,” he said.

Interested in more global health innovation news? Every week GHTC scours media reports worldwide to deliver essential global health R&D news and content to your inbox. Sign-up now to receive our weekly R&D News Roundup email. Since 2015, scientists from the Fiocruz Institute in Brazil have been infecting mosquitoes with Wolbachia bacteria in a lab and then releasing them into the wild in trial tests in the hopes of slowing the spread of mosquito-borne diseases like dengue. Wolbachia bacteria—common among insects except the Aedes aegypti mosquito, which transmits dengue, Zika, and chikungunya—works by boosting a mosquito's immune system, making it less likely to contract disease. However, if a mosquito does contract dengue, Wolbachia makes it harder for the virus to grow inside the insect and be transmitted to humans. The hope is that the lab-infected mosquitoes will reproduce with wild mosquitoes, spreading the bacteria through the population. Scientists report “significant reductions” in cases of dengue and chikungunya in neighborhoods near where mosquitoes were released. Tests also show more than 90 percent of mosquitoes in areas where the first infected insects were released more than three years ago have the bacteria. Scientists see this technique as one in a suite of tools to control mosquito populations and halt the spread of disease. The Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) awarded the Sabin Vaccine Institute (Sabin) an initial US$20.5 million, with options for an additional $107.5 million, to support development of vaccines against Marburg virus and Sudan Ebola virus. With the initial award, Sabin will conduct development and non-clinical activities with the intent of continuing clinical research through phase 2 trials, which may be supported by the additional funding. The Sudan Ebola vaccine candidate is the first of this virus strain to receive BARDA support and the Marburg vaccine candidate is the second to receive BARDA support. BARDA is also supporting the development of vaccines, therapeutics, and diagnostics against the Ebola virus strain causing the current outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. For the first time, researchers have developed a rapid diagnostic test that uses a biomarker in saliva to detect the mosquito-borne parasite that causes malaria. The test, which will be marketed as SALVA!, is less invasive than traditional malaria diagnostics, which require a blood sample, and can even detect the disease before people carrying the parasite show symptoms or fall ill. Easy-to-administer at the community level, the test also delivers results in five to twenty minutes without samples being sent to a lab. Global Health Innovative Technology Fund has awarded the test’s developers more than £1 million for field trials and continued development. The World Health Organization has called for more new tools to detect malaria, a disease for which there are more than 200 million cases worldwide each year.