WHO ANNOUNCES  EBOLA VACCINE TRIALS WILL BE SPEEDED UP TO DECEMBER.
THREE RELATED STORIES.   (Scroll down)

REUTERS                                       OCT. 24

By Stephanie Nebehay and Kate Kelland

GENEVA/LONDON, Oct 24 (Reuters) - Trials of Ebola vaccines could begin in West Africa in December, a month earlier than expected, and hundreds of thousands of doses should be available for use by the middle of next year, the World Health Organization said on Friday.

Vaccines are being developed and made ready in record time by drugmakers working with regulators, the U.N. health agency said, but questions remain about their safety and efficacy which can only be settled by full clinical trials.

"Vaccine is not a magic bullet, but when ready they may be a good part of the effort to turn the tide against the epidemic," senior WHO official Marie-Paule Kieny told a news briefing after a meeting in Geneva of industry executives, global health experts, drug regulators and funders.

UPDATE:   EUROPEAN UNION ANNOUNCES ADDITIONAL FUNDING, NAMES AN EBOLA COORDINATOR 

NEW YORK TIMES   

By James Kanter and Andrew Higgins                                                                      OCT. 24, 2014

BRUSSELS--

...  Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, announced tody that Christos Stylianides, the coming European commissioner for humanitarian aid and crisis management, would be named Ebola coordinator.

UPDATE: THE GUINEAN GIRL DIED IN MALI. WHO IS SENDING MORE STAFF TO HELP STOP FUTHER EXPOSURES.

TIME MAGAZINE                                                             Oct. 24, 2014

A two-year-old Guinean girl who recently traveled to Mali and was later confirmed to have Ebola has died, officials said on Friday, one day after her positive diagnosis meant the virus had reached its sixth nation in West Africa.

The child died  in the western town of Kayes, a health official told Reuters. On Thursday, Health Minister Ousmane Kone told state television that she had traveled from neighboring Guinea,accompanied by her grandmother. The girl was admitted to a hospital on Wednesday night, where she tested positive for Ebola.

Health officials said the girl had begun bleeding from the nose before she left Guinea,, “meaning that the child was symptomatic during their travels through Mali” and that “multiple opportunities for exposure occurred when the child was visibly symptomatic.” The initial investigation identified 43 close and unprotected contacts, including 10 health workers.

CLICK HERE - VIDEO - World Health Summit
Aid Agencies Criticise Slow Ebola Response
Aid agencies fighting Ebola say the international community has been 'woefully underprepared' in tackling the crisis.

CLICK HERE - M 8 Alliance - Berlin Declaration on Ebola
World Health Summit 2014, Berlin October 19 to 22, 2014
(1 page .PDF document)

submitted by George Hurlburt

Special Symposium at the WHS 2014
Ebola: A Wake-Up Call for Global Health

With respect to the Ebola crisis, the World Health Summit has organized a special symposium "Ebola: A Wake-Up Call for Global Health" in association with the German Federal Ministry of Health and the German Federal Foreign Office, held on October 20 from 08:30 to 10:00 (Program >>>).

REUTERS                                                                                                      Oct. 23, 2014

Volunteers who will be sent to Africa in the forthcoming days are taught how to work with patients infected with the Ebola virus during a training session at AP-HP hospital Henri Mondor in Creteil, a suburb of Paris October 22, 2014.

Asked whether countries such as Guinea Bissau, Mali and Ivory Coast might have cases of the disease crossing their borders without knowing about or reporting them, WHO assistant director general Keiji Fukuda said he considered that unlikely.

WHO    GENEVA                                                                         Oct. 23, 2014

 The WHO Ebola Emergency Committee statement issued today, following its meetings this week, said exit screening in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone remains critical for reducing the exportation of Ebola cases.

The statement said "States should maintain and reinforce high-quality exit screening of all persons at international airports, seaport, and major land crossings, for unexplained febrile illness consistent with potential Ebola infection. The exit screening should consist of, at a minimum, a questionnaire, a temperature measurement and, if fever is discovered, an assessment of the risk that the fever is caused by Ebola Virus Disease (EVD). States should collect data from their exit screening processes, monitor their results, and share these with WHO on a regular basis and in a timely fashion. This will increase public confidence and provide important information to other States."

The report also encouraged States that have recently introduced entry screening measures to should share their experiences and lessons learned.

...The Committee reiterated its recommendation that there should be no general ban on international travel or trade.

Health workers wearing protective clothing carry the body of an Ebola virus victim in the Waterloo district of Freetown, Sierra Leone, on Tuesday. Reuters

Volunteer Health Workers Will be Sent to Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea

wsj.com - by Gbenga Akingbule and Drew Hinshaw - October 23, 2014

Nigeria will send 506 medics to its West African neighbors stricken with Ebola, its Health Minister Khaliru Alhassan told reporters Thursday, an announcement that catapults the country into one of the biggest contributors of human talent against the disease.

All of those health workers are volunteers, he said, and they’ll be sent to Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Guinea.

The announcement goes a small distance toward filling a critical shortfall: nurses and doctors willing to treat Ebola patients.

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

HOMELAND SECURITY NEWS WIRE                                         Oct. 22, 2014

Two Ebola researchers suggest that as Ebola continues to spread in West Africa, it may be silently immunizing large numbers of people who never fall ill or infect others, yet become protected from future infection. If such immunity is confirmed, it would have significant ramifications on projections of how widespread the disease will be and could help determine strategies that health workers use to contain the disease, according to a letter published last week in The Lancet medical journal.   http://download.thelancet.com/flatcontentassets/pdfs/PIIS0140673614618390.pdf?id=aaadpDXSyNZVP5Qg76oKu

US IMPOSES MONITORING REQUIREMENTS ON TRAVELERS FROM WEST AFRICA-- AND OTHER DEVELOPMENTS 

REUTERS                                     Oct. 22, 2014

By Bill Berkrot

NEW YORK -- U.S. health officials imposed fresh constraints on Wednesday on people entering the country from three countries at the center of West Africa's Ebola epidemic, mandating that they report their temperature daily and stay in touch with health authorities.

U.S. Coast Guard Health Technician Nathan Wallenmeyer (L) and Customs Border Protection (CBP) Supervisor Sam Ko conduct prescreening measures on a passenger arriving from Sierra Leone at O’Hare International Airport's Terminal 5 in Chicago, in this handout picture taken October 16, 2014.

The move announced by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) marked the latest precautions put in place by the U.S. government to stop the spread of the virus, but stopped short of a ban on travelers from Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea as demanded by some lawmakers.

                                                                            22, October, 2014

WHO's  new report says the number of confirmed,suspected and probable Ebola cases has reached 9936 with 4877 deaths confirmed.

See full Report and graphs

http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/10665/137091/1/roadmapsitrep22Oct2014_eng.pdf?ua=1

NEW YORK TIMES                                 Oct. 22, 2014

A study projects up to three Ebola-infected people could be on overseas flights each month from the three most-affected African countries. WSJ's Gautam Naik reports. Photo: Getty

CLICK HERE - The Lancet - Assessment of the potential for international dissemination of Ebola virus via commercial air travel during the 2014 west African outbreak

wsj.com - by Gautam Naik - Oct. 20, 2014

Up to three Ebola-infected people could embark on overseas flights every month from the three most-affected African countries, according to a new study that projected travel patterns based on infection rates and recent flight schedules.

The findings, published Monday in the journal Lancet, suggest that Ebola cases could be spread overseas by unwitting travelers from the worst-hit countries—Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.

The World Health Organization has estimated that, by early December, there could be as many as 10,000 new cases a week in west Africa.

DEUTSCHE  WELLE                                                                             Oct. 21, 1914

 By Philipp Sandner and Ibrahima Bah

West African countries that have escaped the Ebola outbreak intend to stay free of it by preparing for the worst. It is a strategy that can work as events in Senegal and Nigeria have shown. 

Mali, Senegal, Ivory Coast and Guinea-Bissau are countries that border on the epicenter of the Ebola epidemic that encompasses Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone. All these nations wish to protect themselves.

A health worker takes the temperature of man entering Mali from Guinea

One of the more obvious measures is to screen people entering the country. "We are using thermal imaging cameras to detect people at airports and borders who are running a temperature," said Malian physician Adamas Daou. He works at Mali's National Action Center for the fight against Ebola. Medical personnel are also on duty urging Malians to practice good personal hygiene. "This includes washing their hands in chlorinated water" Daou said.

BBC                                                                                   Oct. 20, 2014

Vital supplies and resources to tackle Ebola are beginning to arrive in the three worst-hit West African countries, Ghana's President John Mahama has said.

Mr Mahama, who heads the regional bloc Ecowas, also told the BBC that treatment centres were being set up in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone. But he called for proper co-ordination between agencies to avoid duplication.

Red Cross workers are among those fighting the outbreak in Sierra Leone

Mr Mahama told the BBC that the World Food Programme was airlifting humanitarian aid to Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea.

"Vehicles, motorcycles and other means of transport are going in there. There's more protective clothing being provided," he said.

"But there's no need for us to duplicate each other and have more treatment centres when we do not have volunteers and health workers to treat the people in the treatment centres.

Read full story

USA TODAY                                                                                     Oct. 21, 2914By Bart Jansen

WASHINGTON — The Department of Homeland Security announced Tuesday that all travelers from Ebola outbreak countries in West Africa will be funneled through one of five U.S. airports with enhanced screening starting Wednesday.

                                                                       (Photo: Melissa Maraj, AP)

Customs and Border Protection within the department began enhanced screening — checking the traveler's temperature and asking about possible exposure to Ebola — at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport on Oct. 11.

Enhanced screening for travelers from Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea was expanded Oct. 16 to Washington's Dulles, Chicago's O'Hare, New Jersey's Newark and Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson international airports.

Those airports were supposed to screen 94% of the average 150 people per day arriving from the three countries. But lawmakers from other states asked for enhanced screening at their airports, too.