Media/Policy Watch

BBC
http://www.bbc.co.uk/
Accessed 31 January 2015
Ebola outbreak: Virus mutating, scientists warn
BBC News | 29 January 2015
Scientists tracking the Ebola outbreak in Guinea say the virus has mutated. Researchers at the Institut Pasteur in France, which first identified the outbreak last March, are investigating whether it could have become more contagious. More than 22,000 people have been infected with Ebola and 8,795 have died in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia.

Ebola crisis: World ‘dangerously unprepared’ for future pandemics
BBC | 28 January 2015
The world is “dangerously unprepared” for future deadly pandemics like the Ebola outbreak in West Africa, the president of the World Bank has warned. Jim Yong Kim, speaking in Washington, said it was vital that governments, corporations, aid agencies and insurance companies worked together to prepare for future outbreaks. He said they needed to learn lessons from the Ebola crisis.

The Economist
http://www.economist.com/
Accessed 31 January 2015
Measles returns: Of vaccines and vacuous starlets
The Economist | 29 January 2015

The Guardian
http://www.guardiannews.com/
Accessed 31 January 2015
Bill Gates predicts HIV vaccine by 2030
The Guardian | 24 January 2015
Bill Gates believes that a vaccine and new intensive drugs to combat HIV should be available by 2030 and end most new cases of the virus that has killed millions in the past three decades…Gates was also optimistic about the battle against malaria, where work on a vaccine is more advanced than for HIV. GSK filed the world’s first malaria vaccine for approval in July 2014. “We won’t see the end of Aids,” Gates told the Davos forum on Friday. “But both for malaria and Aids we’re seeing the tools that will let us do 95-100% reduction. Those tools will be invented during this 15-year period.”

The Huffington Post
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/
Accessed 31 January 2015
2015: Full Speed Ahead
The Huffington Post | 26 January 2015
by Orin Levine
We are already midway through the first month of the 2015—and more importantly, midway through the Decade of Vaccines. With much to accomplish, I compiled a quick list of the 10 advances in global health and vaccinations I would like to see in 2015: A fully-funded Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, with Alliance partners energized by that success and driving to achieve its ambitious goal of preventing 5 to 6 million deaths and increasing access to vaccines for everyone. Strong routine immunization is a platform for child health programs and makes a big contribution to ending preventable child death.

Reuters
http://www.reuters.com/
Accessed 31 January 2015
Liberia Ebola vaccine trial “challenging” as cases tumble
Reuters | 25 January 2015
A steep fall in Ebola cases in Liberia will make it hard to prove whether experimental vaccines work in a major clinical trial about to start in the country, the head of the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) said on Saturday. The NIH might have to move some testing to neighbouring Sierra Leone, while regulators could end up approving Ebola shots based on efficacy data from animal tests backed by only limited human evidence, Francis Collins told Reuters…”It’s going to be a hard trial,” Collins said on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos. “It’s possible we may have to move some of the effort to Sierra Leone, which is unfortunately in not quite such a good position as Liberia”… Nonetheless, vaccines could still be submitted to regulators using efficacy data from non-human primate experiments, plus proof of safety and immune system response in humans.

Wall Street Journal
http://online.wsj.com/home-page?_wsjregion=na,us&_homepage=/home/us
Accessed 31 January 2015
A New Index Measures Impact Pharma Has on Infectious Diseases
Wall Street Journal | 23 January 2015
The pharmaceutical industry regularly boasts that its efforts to develop treatments for infectious diseases in poor nations are making a difference. But for those wondering how to gauge those efforts, a new metric has been created. The Global Health Impact Index measures three factors: the need for several important drugs for three specific infectious diseases: tuberculosis, HIV/AIDS and malaria; the effectiveness of the available treatments; and the number of people who can access those drugs. The rankings estimate the amount of death and disability the drugs are alleviating…there is currently no way to determine the extent to which drug makers and their products are having a desired effect, according to Nicole Hassoun, an associate philosophy professor at Binghamton University, who developed the index.

Fear Measles, Not Vaccines
Wall Street Journal | 26 January 2015
A measles outbreak traced to the Disneyland theme park in California has infected nearly 70 people since December. Even before this alarming episode, 2014 saw the worst U.S. measles outbreak in two decades. What else happened last year? More than 13,000 parents nationwide claimed on forms that vaccinating their children from preventable diseases like measles violated their “personal beliefs.” Most of these parents are motivated by irrational fears. It is human to be nervous about injecting foreign substances into a child’s body, but should parents be more afraid of the vaccine or the virus? With measles, there is no question: The virus is the danger.