Russia Ready to Introduce New Ebola Vaccines in Six Months: Russian Health Minister (222 hits)
Topic: Ebola Outbreak in West Africa
UFA, October 11 (RIA Novosti) - Russian virologists are planning to introduce vaccines to fight Ebola within the next six months, the country's Health Minister Veronika Skvortsova stated Saturday.
"We are now creating three vaccines... And they will be created, we think, in the next six months," Skvortsova said in an interview to Rossiya-1 TV channel.
She also said that Russia has begun the creation of special drugs that will also be used for the prevention and treatment of Ebola.
The Ebola epidemic currently taking place in West Africa broke out in southern Guinea in February, and later spread across the entire region, with cases also having been reported in Spain and the United States. The number of people who have died from the Ebola virus has reached 4,033, while a total of 8,399 cases have been reported, the World Health Organization said Friday.
The Ebola virus is transmitted through direct contact with the bodily fluids of those infected. Though there is no officially approved medication for the disease, several countries, including Russia, the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada and Japan are currently working on developing Ebola vaccines.
