The Sabin Vaccine Institute has delivered approximately 1,000 more investigational vaccine doses to Rwanda to step up response to Marburg virus disease outbreak, the American organisation announced on Saturday, October 12.

The development follows Sabin’s initial shipment of 700 doses of the same vaccine on October 5 – nine days after the outbreak was confirmed in Rwanda, on September 27.

On October 6, Rwandan health authorities began vaccinating frontline health workers as part of a Phase 2 rapid response open-label trial, sponsored by the Rwanda Biomedical Centre (RBC), the institute said in a statement.

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As of Saturday, 620 vaccine doses of the initial supply had been administered, it added.

The Sabin Institute’s single-dose vaccine will be administered in accordance with the clinical protocol that has been reviewed and approved by Rwandan ethics and regulatory authorities, the organisation said.

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Sabin is a member of MARVAC, a WHO-coordinated consortium promoting international collaboration for the development of vaccines against Marburg virus disease.

It stated that its development programme, which includes clinical trials and manufacturing of clinical trial material that have been leveraged in this donation, is supported by the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA), part of the Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, under multi-year contracts.

Data from the Ministry of Health shows that since the announcement of the outbreak on September 27, 61 cases of Marburg virus had been confirmed as of October 12.

14 people had died, while 29 were in isolation and receiving treatment, and 18 who had recovered.