A vaccine trial on chimpanzees conducted at the New Iberia Research Center could help protect endangered wild apes from the Ebola virus and other deadly infectious diseases.
Researchers tested a virus-like particle vaccine, which contains a small amount of viral proteins but can’t replicate. The trial is believed to be the first time that a vaccine intended for apes – rather than humans – has been tested on captive chimpanzees. Results were published in an issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences journal earlier this summer.
Subsequent media coverage from many national and international media outlets underscored the significance of the groundbreaking trial. “At first glance, the study looked like a lot of other medical research, in which drugs that are meant for humans are first tested on other animals. But this was different. These scientists were working with chimps to help chimps,” a National Geographic online article noted.
Vaccines haven’t been used to fight outbreaks of diseases in chimpanzees and gorillas because of concerns about the vaccines’ safety. Conservationists, however, are becoming increasingly receptive to their potential due to high mortality rates, said Dr. Joe Simmons, NIRC director.
The virus, which causes an aggressive hemorrhagic fever, has decimated world populations of chimpanzees and gorillas. The disease is also deadly for people. It’s transmitted through human contact and through consumption of animals that have contracted Ebola.
An outbreak of the Zaire strain of Ebola in West Africa – the largest ever – had caused at least 780 documented cases and more than 481 deaths, as of mid-July. Chimpanzees at the NIRC were tested for the same strain. Researchers determined that apes given the virus-like particles and an adjuvant, a substance that enhances immune system response, developed enough resistance to survive the Zaire strain.
“We demonstrated that they had antibodies that would be protective,” Simmons said.