Dive Brief:
- The International Severe Acute Respiratory and Emerging Infection Consortium (SARIC) is starting to conduct clinical studies of Tekmira's new Ebola drug, TKM-Ebola-Guinea, with funding from Wellcome.
- There are currently 100 treatment courses available for study.
- Preclinical study demonstrated efficacy results comparable to Tekmira's TKM-Ebola of up to 100% protection.
Dive Insight:
The urgency associated with the need to prevent wide-scale infectious transmission of Ebola has strengthened ties between the academic community and industry, as reflected by the relationship between SARIC and Tekmira.
Add to that, the ability of RNAi-based technology to facilitate testing of various vaccine formulations to combat multiple virus variants, and the chances of successful development of an effective vaccine by 2015 is not only possible, but likely.