LONDON (Reuters) &#8211; Scientists are a step closer to being able to cure the deadly Ebola haemorrhagic fever after two experimental drugs showed survival rates of as much as 90% in a clinical trial in Congo.



Two experimental drugs &#8211; an antibody cocktail called REGN-EB3 developed by Regeneron and a monoclonal antibody called mAb114 &#8211; will now be offered to all patients infected with the viral disease in an ongoing outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).



The drugs showed “clearly better” results, according to U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), in a trial of four potential treatments being conducted during the second-largest Ebola outbreak in history, now entering its second year in DRC.



The drugs improved survival rates from the disease more than two other treatments being tested &#8211; ZMapp, made by Mapp Biopharmaceutical, and Remdesivir, made by Gilead Sciences &#8211; and those products will be now dropped, said Anthony Fauci, one of the researchers co-leading the trial.



The agency said 49% of the patients on ZMapp and 53% on Remdesivir died in the study. In comparison, 29% of the patients on REGN-EB3 and 34% on mAb114 died.



Jean-Jacques Muyembe, director general of Congo’s Institut National de Recherche Biomédicale in DRC, who co-led the trial, said the results meant that “from now on, we will no longer say that Ebola is incurable.”



“These advances will help save thousands of lives,” he told reporters.



Anthony Fauci, NIAID’s director, also said the results were “very good news” for the fight against Ebola.



The agency said that of the patients who were brought into treatment centres with low levels of virus detected in their blood, 94% who got REGN-EB3 and 89% on mAb114 survived.



In comparison, two-thirds of the patients who got Remdesivir and nearly three-quarters on ZMapp survived.



Ebola has been spreading in eastern Congo since August 2018 in an outbreak that has now killed at least 1,800 people. Efforts to control it have been hampered by militia violence and some local resistance to outside help.



A vast Ebola outbreak in West Africa from 2013 to 2016 became the world’s largest ever when it spread through Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone and killed more than 11,300 people.



The Congo treatment trial, which began in November last year, is being carried out by an international research group coordinated by the World Health Organization (WHO).



Mike Ryan, head of the WHO’s emergencies program, said the trial’s positive findings were encouraging but would not be enough on their own to bring the epidemic to an end.



“The news today is fantastic. It gives us a new tool in our toolbox against Ebola, but it will not in itself stop Ebola,” he told reporters.



Jeremy Farrar, director of the Wellcome Trust global health charity, also hailed the success of the trial’s findings, saying they would “undoubtedly save lives”.



“The more we learn about these two treatments &#8230; the closer we can get to turning Ebola from a terrifying disease to one that is preventable and treatable,” he said in a statement.



“We won’t ever get rid of Ebola but we should be able to stop these outbreaks from turning into major national and regional epidemics.”



Some 681 patients at four separate treatment centres in Congo have already been enrolled in the Congo treatment clinical trial, Fauci said. The study aims to enrol a total of 725.



The decision to drop two of the trial drugs was based on data from almost 500 patients, he said, which showed that those who got REGN-EB3 or mAb114 “had a greater chance of survival compared to those participants in the other two arms”.



The two promising drugs are made from Ebola antibodies &#8211; a protein produced by the immune system to defend against infection. Regeneron’s product is a cocktail of three Ebola antibodies, while mAb114 is a single antibody developed by scientists at NIAID.



Reporting by Kate Kelland, additional reporting by Ankur Banerjee and Manojna Maddipatla; Editing by Mark Heinrich, Arun Koyyur and Hugh Lawson

Scientists are a step closer to curing Ebola as Congo trial finds drugs boost survival

KINSHASA/KIGALI (Reuters) &#8211; Congo’s presidency said on Thursday that Rwandan authorities had closed the border between Goma and its nearest town of Gisenyi for all people other than Congolese citizens leaving Rwanda.



Goma had its second case of Ebola fever confirmed this week.



“The Congolese authorities deplore this decision, which runs counter to the advice of the WHO (World Health Organisation),” on fighting the virus, the statement said.



Rwandan state minister for foreign affairs ministry, Olivier Nduhungirehe, told Reuters by phone: “Yes it has been closed, but for details you can call immigration and ministry of health because it is about Ebola.”



Reporting by Stanys Bujakera in Kinshasa and Clement Uwiringiyimana in Kigali; Writing by Tim Cocks and Omar Mohammed; Editing by Hugh Lawson

Rwanda shuts border near Goma after second case of Ebola fever confirmed in the DRC city

GENEVA (Reuters) &#8211; A Congolese woman who may have spread the deadly Ebola virus in Uganda did not go to Rwanda or the Congolese city of Goma while contagious, the World Health Organization said on Friday.



On Thursday, a report written by Uganda’s Health Ministry and published by the WHO’s Africa office had said the woman, a fishmonger, was suspected of going to Goma and Rwanda as well as Uganda before she died.



That raised fears of the outbreak spreading in Rwanda, which has never had a recorded case of Ebola.



But the WHO later withdrew the report and shut down the website where the daily updates were being posted, saying some of the information had not been verified. [nL8N24J2MF]



“We have investigated fully, and there was no travel to anywhere but Uganda,” WHO spokeswoman Margaret Harris said, adding that inaccurate conjecture had unfortunately found its way into the reports.



Healthworkers have mounted a massive campaign of vigilance and vaccination on key routes and borders in the region, and have screened almost 75 million people since the outbreak was declared 11 months ago. It has killed more than 1,700 people.



The 22-year-old woman was thought to have crossed the border between Uganda and Congo at an unmonitored crossing point, the deleted reports said. Harris said there no chance she had also slipped into Rwanda without being spotted.



“We are absolutely certain,” she said. “Our team&#8230; went across and talked to everybody and tracked it day-by-day. Now in her life she may have gone to Rwanda&#8230; but the important thing is she did not spend any time in Rwanda while symptomatic.”



It was extraordinary that a woman with end-stage Ebola had managed to cross the border and sell fish for a day, she added.



A lot of people at potential risk were now being followed up and people were being vaccinated on both sides of the border, Harris said. But it would take several days before it became clear if the woman, who vomited several times at a market, had infected anyone.



Other details in the withdrawn reports were also unverified, including information about a second Congolese Ebola patient travelling to the same market, and about a group of Ugandan healthworkers who may have been exposed to Ebola.



Reporting by Tom Miles; Editing by Mark Heinrich

WHO says investigators conclude that Congolese woman who may have spread the Ebola virus in Uganda did not enter Rwanda

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Niniola Soleye, Managing Director of the Dr Stella Adadevoh Trust, and Dr. Glen Gaulton, the vice Dean and Director at the Centre for Global Health join CNBC Africa to discuss the level of preparedness for disease outbreaks in the region.

Ebola virus

Scientists are a step closer to curing Ebola as Congo trial finds drugs boost survival

Rwanda shuts border near Goma after second case of Ebola fever confirmed in the DRC city

WHO says investigators conclude that Congolese woman who may have spread the Ebola virus in Uganda did not enter Rwanda

Ebola 3 years later: Are we ready for the next epidemic?

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Ebola virus

Scientists are a step closer to curing Ebola as Congo trial finds drugs boost survival

Rwanda shuts border near Goma after second case of Ebola fever confirmed in the DRC city

WHO says investigators conclude that Congolese woman who may have spread the Ebola virus in Uganda did not enter Rwanda

Ebola 3 years later: Are we ready for the next epidemic?

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