London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine

Expert reaction to a paper published in Nature Medicine about Ebola immunity generated in non-human primates. The study reported the use of two vaccines to protect against Ebola virus in macaques, with protection seen up to ten months after vaccination.

Martin Hibberd, Professor of Emerging Infectious Disease at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, said:

"The paper by Sullivan and colleagues describes a novel vaccine approach to Ebola that gives hope for a successful trial in humans, with the innovative prime-boost method overcoming a known limitation of this method. However, this chimpanzee adenovirus vaccine may still have an unusually large barrier to overcome when transferring to humans, so I hope these trials can begin as soon as possible. A long lasting protective immunisation process is just what is needed."