According to Collins, NIH have been working on finding Ebola vaccine since 2010 yet the support for the research declined in the last decade causing slow developments in their research. Dr. Collins is confident that with a full support, the agency would have been ready to fight Ebola today.
Collins has been spending much of his days in NIH headquarters in MD finding possible cure and vaccine against Ebola virus yet he admitted they are still far behind. Collins said money is really a problem. According to reports, NIH almost has the same budget ten years ago. In 2004, NIH has a budget of $28.03 billion and in 2013, it has $29.31 billion causing other departments under the agency to suffer. The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases for example had $4.30 billion in 2004 but in 2013, they just had $4.25 billion. NIH has not received any additional money as well now that they are working on finding a vaccine for Ebola. Dr. Collins said this current fight have affected other researches. Some money for influenza vaccine as an example, were now diverted and used in finding Ebola vaccine.
With the current budget, NIH is rushing things and are now conducting limited trials for Ebola vaccine. Most trials though are on monkeys and not humans because as Dr. Collins put it, human trial takes time and resources as well.
Collins said that human trials cannot be done easily because 'sometimes vaccines not only don't work, they make things worse.'
Posted by Unknown on Monday, October 13, 2014 - Rating: 4.5
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