Links to new research on Ebola: June 2016

The last hurrah. New material from June 2016. From here on, good luck and I look forward to skimming the literature from time-to-time without posting it up here.

Therapeutics and Vaccines

• Lieselotte Cnops and colleagues show the performance of the rapid Idylla™ prototype Ebola virus test. Development, Evaluation, and Integration of a Quantitative Reverse-Transcription Polymerase Chain Reaction Diagnostic Test for Ebola Virus on a Molecular Diagnostics Platform.
• Mingjuan Yang and colleagues show the performance of a strain-specific rapid nucleic acid test based on recombinase polymerase amplification (EBOV-RPA). Development and Evaluation of a Rapid and Sensitive EBOV-RPA Test for Rapid Diagnosis of Ebola Virus Disease.
• Jestina Doe-Anderson and colleagues describe the practicalities of running the PREVAIL I trial. Beating the odds: Successful establishment of a Phase II/III clinical research trial in resource-poor Liberia during the largest-ever Ebola outbreak.

Epidemiology

• Thomas Weppelmann and colleagues describe the epidemiology of the 607 suspected/probable/confirmed Ebola cases in Bong county. Determinants of patient survival during the 2014 Ebola Virus Disease outbreak in Bong County, Liberia.
• Yngvar Lunde Haaskjold and colleagues describe 31 cases admitted to Moyamba ETC over three months. Clinical Features of and Risk Factors for Fatal Ebola Virus Disease, Moyamba District, Sierra Leone, December 2014–February 2015. Javier Arranz and colleagues describe the clinical features of 75 admitted individuals at the same ETC in the same period. Clinical features of suspected Ebola cases referred to the Moyamba ETC, Sierra Leone: challenges in the later stages of the 2014 outbreak.
• Kim Lindblade and colleagues analyse 17 transmission chains covering 347 individuals to estimate risk factors for ongoing infection. Secondary Infections with Ebola Virus in Rural Communities, Liberia and Guinea, 2014–2015.
• Constantinos Siettos and colleagues model the age-specific per-contact probability of Ebola virus transmission in Liberia using agent-based simulations.
• Zhe Xu and colleagues describe the epidemiolgy of 139 patients with Ebola virus disease at the Jui Holding and Treatment Centre in western Sierra Leone.
• Tejshri Shah and colleagues review the epidemiology of 91 children admitted to MSF management centres in Sierra Leone in 2014. Inpatient signs and symptoms and factors associated with death in children aged 5 years and younger admitted to two Ebola management centres in Sierra Leone, 2014: a retrospective cohort study.

Epidemic control strategies

• Ruwan Ratnayake and colleagues review 12,126 community event–based surveillance events in Sierra Leone between Feb and Sept 2015, evaluating their (low) sensitivity and suggesting improvements for the future. Assessment of Community Event–Based Surveillance for Ebola Virus Disease, Sierra Leone, 2015.
• Hai Jiang and colleagues report on a survey of community members after the implementation of the intensified training for an EVD response project (ITERP) in March 2015. Rapid assessment of knowledge, attitudes, practices, and risk perception related to the prevention and control of Ebola virus disease in three communities of Sierra Leone.
• Olushayo Olu and colleagues review the 3,838 confirmed cases and 32,706 contacts in the Western Areas Districts, highlighting gaps in the contact tracing process and potential improvements in future outbreaks. Contact Tracing during an Outbreak of Ebola Virus Disease in the Western Area Districts of Sierra Leone: Lessons for Future Ebola Outbreak Response.
• Oliver Johnson and colleagues review the Kings/SL government EHU system. Ebola Holding Units at government hospitals in Sierra Leone: evidence for a flexible and effective model for safe isolation, early treatment initiation, hospital safety and health system functioning.
• Yang Luo and colleagues describe the design and implementation of a Chinese ETC outside Monrovia. Toward sustainable and effective control: Experience of China Ebola Treatment Center in Liberia.
• John Vinson and colleagues model the potential impact of sexual transmission on an Ebola outbreak.The potential for sexual transmission to compromise control of Ebola virus outbreaks.

There were also a couple of more conceptual modelling papers this month:

• Gianluca Frasso and Philippe Lambert add Bayesian inference to a compartmental model to flexibly estimate early epidemic parameters. Bayesian inference in an extended SEIR model with nonparametric disease transmission rate: an application to the Ebola epidemic in Sierra Leone.
• Kamalaldin Kamalaldin and colleagues review modelling approaches to Ebola. Modelling Ebola.

Survivors

• Ionara Rabelo and colleagues present focus group research on psychological distress among Ebola survivors discharged from an Ebola Treatment Unit in Monrovia, Liberia.

Health care for Ebola

• Shannon McMahon and colleagues use qualitative interviews with 35 providers working in eight non-Ebola health units in Bo and Kenema Districts to describe the impact of the epidemic on healthcare workers. Healthcare providers on the frontlines: a qualitative investigation of the social and emotional impact of delivering health services during Sierra Leone’s Ebola epidemic.

Ebola epidemic impact

• Wenshu Li and colleagues report on a national household survey conducted in Sierra Leone in July 2015. Public Confidence in the Health Care System 1 Year After the Start of the Ebola Virus Disease Outbreak.
• Ben Morse and colleagues describe a rebound in healthcare seeking behaviour post-Ebola based on a cellphone-based panel survey. Patterns of demand for non-Ebola health services during and after the Ebola outbreak: panel survey evidence from Monrovia, Liberia.
• GianLuca Quaglio and colleagues describe how paediatric care in Pujehun district changed as the epidemic progressed. Maintaining Maternal and Child Health Services During the Ebola Outbreak: Experience from Pujehun, Sierra Leone.
• Owolabi Bjälkander and colleagues describe the suspension of traditional FGM during Ebola and how this situation is now being reversed. FGM in the time of Ebola—carpe opportunitatem.
• Henry Perry and colleagues outline the opportunity and potential benefits of national community healthworker programmes post-Ebola. Community health worker programmes after the 2013–2016 Ebola outbreak.

Other items

• Gloria Chidimma Nwafor, in her thesis, takes a human rights lens to healthcare provision for people infect with Ebola.
• Danielle Westhoff Smith and colleagues consider survival of Ebola virus on fomites. Ebola Virus Stability Under Hospital and Environmental Conditions.
• Emmie de Wit and colleagues describe the Ebola laboratory response in Monrovia. Ebola Laboratory Response at the Eternal Love Winning Africa Campus, Monrovia, Liberia, 2014–2015.

That’s all folks, thanks.

Links to new research on Ebola: May 2016

Yes, this is late. Sorry. But here’s all the new stuff I saw in May of this year:

Therapeutics and Vaccines

• Karen Martins and colleagues provide an overview of 11 current candidate Ebola vaccines. Ebola Virus Disease Candidate Vaccines Under Evaluation in Clinical Trials.
• Selidji Agnandji and colleagues report on three phase-1 trials of rVSV-ZEBOV. http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1502924
• Ana Maria Henao-Restrepo and colleagues review the role played by the WHO in developing Ebola vaccines during the recent epidemic. On a path to accelerate access to Ebola vaccines: The WHO’s research and development efforts during the 2014–2016 Ebola epidemic in West Africa.

Epidemiology

• Paula Ruibal and colleagues examine the T-cell response to Ebola, and how the virus disrupts it. Unique human immune signature of Ebola virus disease in Guinea.
• Hilary Bower and colleagues evaluate exposure-  and age-specific attack rates in Ebola-Affected Households in Sierra Leone.
• Xiaoping Shao and colleagues describe the clinical presentation and care of 5 confirmed cases of Ebola seen at the China Ebola Treatment Unit, Liberia.
• Bridgette Billioux and colleagues describe 3 case studies of acute neurological manifestations of Ebola. Accounts from Liberia: Reports of Neurological Manifestations During the Acute Phase of Ebola Virus Disease.
• Atis Muehlenbachs and colleagues describe 2 case histories of pregnant women with Ebola from Uganda and the DRC. Ebola virus disease in pregnancy: clinical, histopathologic and immunohistochemical findings.
• Armando Arias and colleagues describe the local lab setup for sequencing Ebola, and its use in contact and outbreak investigations. Rapid outbreak sequencing of Ebola virus in Sierra Leone identifies transmission chains linked to sporadic cases.
• Felicity Fitzgerald and colleagues describe the EHU model and highlight the lack of understanding on best practice for child care in the context of possible Ebola infection. Ebola response in Sierra Leone: The impact on children.
• Comparison of children testing negative and positive for Ebola virus disease in Ebola holding units, Sierra Leone.
• Felicity Fitzgerald and other colleagues presented a comparison of children testing negative and positive for Ebola at EHUs in Sierra Leone and another describing the positive cohort in detail.

Epidemic control strategies (mostly models)

• Benjamin Ivorra and colleagues validate Be-CoDiS (Between-Countries Disease Spread), a deterministic spatial-temporal model, using data from the West Africa outbreak.Stability and sensitivity analysis of Be-CoDiS, an epidemiological model to predict the spread of human diseases between countries.
• Jia Kangbai, in his masters thesis, evaluates how gender predicts who calls in suspected Ebola cases to cellphone-based syndromic surviellance systems. Social network analysis of cellphone surveillance data for Ebola in Sierra Leone.
• Zhilan Feng and colleagues explore which model assumptions may have driven the poor performance of many mathematical models for Ebola. Mathematical models of Ebola—Consequences of underlying assumptions.

Ebola healthcare

• Mikiko Senga and colleagues describe the 66 healthworker Ebola cases at Kenema Government Hospital early in the epidemic. Factors Underlying Ebola Virus Infection Among Health Workers, Kenema, Sierra Leone, 2014-2015.
• Lucy Lamb and colleagues describe the design process for the UK military ETU sent to Sierra Leone. Formulating and improving care while mitigating risk in a military Ebola virus disease treatment unit.
• Rosemarie Fernandez and colleagues highlight the potential for checklists to significantly reduce the potential for healthcare worker infection. Proactive Risk Assessment for Ebola-Infected Patients: A Systematic Approach to Identifying and Minimizing Risk to Healthcare Personnel.

Survivors

• Mamadou Sow and colleagues show ongoing virus in semen even at 6-8 months post-illness in 68 men. New Evidence of Long-lasting Persistence of Ebola Virus Genetic Material in Semen of Survivors. Ian Croziera provides an editorial on the Sow et al. article. Ebola Virus RNA in the Semen of Male Survivors of Ebola Virus Disease: The Uncertain Gravitas of a Privileged Persistence.
• Edward Green and colleagues show low levels of virus secretion 6 weeks post-viraemia in 112 survivors in largely non-genital/semen samples. Viraemia and Ebola virus secretion in survivors of Ebola virus disease in Sierra Leone: a cross-sectional cohort study.
• Jessica L. Abbate and colleagues model the potential impact of post-infection infectiousness via sexual intercourse. Potential Impact of Sexual Transmission on Ebola Virus Epidemiology: Sierra Leone as a Case Study.
• Hilary Bower and colleagues also examined rates of re-emerging illness and death amongst survivors. Deaths, late deaths, and role of infecting dose in Ebola virus disease in Sierra Leone: retrospective cohort study.

Impact of Ebola on other things

• Jonathan Suk and colleagues describe a post-Ebola measles outbreak in Lola, Guinea, January–June 2015.
• Isaac Luginaah and colleagues  describe antenatal care prior to the outbreak. Timing and utilization of antenatal care services in Liberia: Understanding the pre-Ebola epidemic context.

Other items (mostly trying to understand what went wrong)

• Lawrence O. Gostin and colleagues summarize the findings of four commissions evaluating the West African outbreak and its response. Toward a Common Secure Future: Four Global Commissions in the Wake of Ebola.
• Nidhi Bhatnagar and colleagues present a scoping review highlighting various potential explanations for the size of the West Africa outbreak. Study of recent Ebola virus outbreak and lessons learned: A scoping study.
• Michael Oluyemi Babalola and Georgina Njideka Odaibo conduct a biological SWOT analysis of Ebola as a pathogen. The strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (SWOTs) analyses of the Ebola virus.
• Vera Scott and colleagues evaluate how using a PHC perspective could help avoid future similar Ebola outbreaks in the region. Critiquing the response to the Ebola epidemic through a Primary Health Care Approach.
• Shaunak Sastry and Alessandro Lovari use a narrative analysis framework to study the Ebola-related messaging on the WHO and CDC Facebook pages. Communicating the Ontological Narrative of Ebola: An Emerging Disease in the Time of “Epidemic 2.0”.
• Kate Thomas, editor, provides a retrospective of Ebola Deeply‘s work during the outbreak.

One more month of material to come…

Links to new research on Ebola: April 2016

As ever, tempus fugit. I have finally accepted I will not be keeping up with the Ebola literature any time soon. So I am posting three more lists of links, covering April, May and June of 2016, and then leaving you all to run your own PubMed and GoogleScholar alerts (I set mine for delivery weekly and whenever Google wants to send me something respectively). After that, it is back to occasional posts on the social determinants of HIV, TB, etc (i.e. my day job). It has been a privilege learning so much about an awful outbreak and the phenomenal efforts made by so many to fight it. Thank you for dropping by and motivating me to stay focused, and sometimes even up-to-date.

First up, things indexed in April 2016.

Therapeutics and Vaccines

• Jake Dunning, Foday Sahr and colleagues report the TKM-130803 trial from early 2015, which was stopped for futility based on non-improved survival vs historic controls. Experimental Treatment of Ebola Virus Disease with TKM-130803: A Single-Arm Phase 2 Clinical Trial.
• Iain Milligan and colleagues report on safety data from a phase-I trial on Ad26.ZEBOV delivered via MVA-BN-Filo. Safety and Immunogenicity of Novel Adenovirus Type 26– and Modified Vaccinia Ankara–Vectored Ebola Vaccines: A Randomized Clinical Trial.

Epidemiology

• Hilary Bower and colleagues showed no additional risk for EVD amongst 77 children in households with EVD survivors, over and above that conferred by their mothers’ history of EVD. Effects of Mother’s Illness and Breastfeeding on Risk of Ebola Virus Disease in a Cohort of Very Young Children.
• Anna Grigoryan and colleagues presented a comprehensive literature review of Mental Health and Psychosocial Aspects of Ebola Virus Disease.
• Li Wen-Gang and colleagues examined 278 EVD-suspected but negative patients at Jui hospital between November 2014 and March 2015. The etiology of Ebola virus disease-like illnesses in Ebola virusnegative patients from Sierra Leone.

Epidemic control strategies

• Rebecca Levine and colleagues describe the setting up of a contact tracing system in Kambia. Development of a Contact Tracing System for Ebola Virus Disease — Kambia District, Sierra Leone, January–February 2015.
• Christian Ahrberg and colleagues describe the early development of a hand-held point-of-care RT-PCR device. Palm-sized device for point-of-care Ebola detection.
• Jennifer Huang and colleagues describe the practicalities of using rapid diagnostic tests in the field. Baseline Assessment of the Use of Ebola Rapid Diagnostic Tests — Forécariah, Guinea, October–November 2015.
• V Cáceres and colleagues on prospective monitoring of laboratories for EVD outbreaks. Daily zero-reporting for suspect Ebola using short message service (SMS) in Guinea-Bissau.
• Huijun Xi and colleagues describe training and maintaining care in donning/doffing of protective clothing for healthcare workers. Improving health care workers’ protection against infection of Ebola hemorrhagic fever through video surveillance.
• Kimberly Gittings and Kelly Matson explored the levels of vaccine coverage required to reduce the reproductive number for Ebola below one. Establishing herd immunity against Ebola through vaccination.
• Zuiyuan Guo, Dan Xiao and colleagues present a long-term model of Ebola dynamics highlighting the risk of periodic re-eruptions (on 5-15 year cycles). Predicting and Evaluating the Epidemic Trend of Ebola Virus Disease in the 2014-2015 Outbreak and the Effects of Intervention Measures.

Health care for Ebola

• Karen Wong and colleagues describe the 6 heathcare workers given rVSV-ZEBOV or TKM-100802 as PEP in 2014 and early 2015. Use of post-exposure prophylaxis after occupational exposure to Zaire ebolavirus.

Ebola epidemic impact

• F Moisan and colleagues show modest reductions in health centre attendance during the Ebola outbreak, but highlight a reduced ability to conduct proactive surveillance for non-Ebola infections. Public health structures attendance during the Ebola outbreak in Guéckédou, Guinea.

Survivors

• Timothy Uyeki and colleagues present RT-PCR and culture results from 5 men to show Ebola virus persistence in semen of male survivors at 290 and 70 days respectively.
• Lauren Bowen and colleagues made a presentation highlighting that in the PREVAIL III study of 87 survivors of Ebola Virus Disease, many have persistent neurological deficits.

Other items

• A Carrión Martín and colleagues describe social and cultural factors behind community resistance during an Ebola outbreak in a village of the Guinean Forest region, February 2015 based on observation interviews and focus group discussions.
• Jessica Spengler and colleagues provide a broad overview of the epidemic, including social and biological factors. Perspectives on West Africa Ebola Virus Disease Outbreak, 2013–2016.
• Zhilan Feng and colleagues critically evaluate the commonly used Legrand mathematical models of Ebola and discuss the consequences of its underlying assumptions.
• David Blackley and colleagues use data from two Ebola flare-ups in Liberia in 2015 to highlight reduced evolutionary rate in reemerged Ebola virus transmission chains, based on slower evolution during persistent infection.