What is the Ebola virus?
Since 1976, Africa has faced sporadic outbreaks of Ebola Virus Disease (EVD), which results in horrible deaths and widespread fear. This current EVD crisis has caused more than 5,000 deaths within a few months in West Africa (with Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia being the most severely affected countries). The victims include numerous healthcare workers. The WHO states that this outbreak is a health bio-threat to Africa and other countries. It also stresses the need to mobilise resources in all countries around the world to fight this disease. There are major obstacles to tackling the crisis, such as the lack of rapid bedside diagnostics. To fill these gaps, we have established a multidisciplinary research consortium with a focus goal.
Natural epidemics and outbreaks of emerging infectious diseases are a growing problem internationally. Since 1976, Africa has faced sporadic outbreaks of EVD, which results in a horrible death and widespread fear. EVD is caused by the EBOV, which belongs to the family Filoviridae in the order Mononegavirales.
Filoviruses are enveloped, non-segmented and negative-stranded RNA viruses of varying morphology. EBOV disease remains a plague for the population of equatorial Africa, with an increase in the numbers of outbreaks and cases since the year 2000. EVD is characterised by high fever, prostration, diarrhoea and haemorrhagic manifestations, with a fatality rate of up to 90%. The disease is enzootic and causes severe disease in humans, chimpanzees and gorillas. EVD poses a great threat to public health due to its high mortality rate in man and its modes of transmission (animal-to-person and person-to-person).
2014 Ebola crisis
No previous Ebola outbreak has been as large or persistent as the current epidemic in West Africa. To date, since March 2014, more than 10,000 people, including healthcare workers, have been killed by EBOV. Strikingly, the number of cases in the current outbreak has already exceeded the number from previous outbreaks combined. The World Health Organisation states that this outbreak in West Africa constitutes an ‘extraordinary event’, posing a public health threat to Africa and the rest of the planet. The United Nations also recognises this epidemic as a threat to Africa and the rest of the world, and stresses the necessity of extraordinary action from all countries and from different sectors of society, such as health, research, politics, finances, etc. In her speech on 20 September 2014 at the United Nations, Dr. Joanne Liu, International President of Médecins Sans Frontières, emphasised that “collaborative research and accessible data to all are required”.
With the EbolaMoDRAD project, activities will be focused on developing robust, sensitive and rapid diagnostic tools for field investigation and laboratories with low technical settings. The EbolaMoDRAD project aims to build existing leading-edge expertise in Europe and Africa. It will bring together new networks of scientists to collaborate towards solving important public health issues concerning EVD, that are intractable to solve by individual groups and countries alone. In this programme, we will bring together several essential elements such as: clinical samples from West Africa, access to mobile laboratories in endemic areas of West Africa, novel approaches for detection of viral antigens, unique biosafety strategies for handling samples, unique facilities, SMEs and a long experience of transferring knowledge to develop a biosafe bedside diagnostic. Additionally this programme will also contribute to capacity building in affected areas and neighbouring countries.
