From Global to Local: Motivations of Research Laboratories and Participants in the Senegal ACHIV-Ebola Clinical Trial

• In Event: Global Vaccine Logics: New Trends in an Old Assemblage

Abstract

While hundreds have died from Ebola outbreaks in the Democratic Republic of Congo since the disease was first identified in 1976, the West Africa pandemic of 2014-15 spurred intensive competition among vaccine researchers with more than 11,000 deaths and a threat to international security. While research and development for a new vaccine can take 10 to 20 years, in just months an experimental vaccine, rVSV-ZEBOV, was ready to stop the chain of transmission. By early 2019, however, the vaccine, has yet to be approved. A race to approval by several competing vaccine manufacturers has been taking place in Africa and around the world. One of studies, the ACHIV-Ebola randomized multi-site clinical trial, is testing the development of Ebola vaccine technologies among PLHIV in Canada, Burkina Faso, and Senegal. In this paper I present aspects of issues raised by the globally standardized study that are specific to the clinical trial site in Dakar, Senegal. Particular issues associated with the mobilization of the local laboratories and hospitals, transfer of samples, recruitment of and motivations for study participants, national and international regulatory requirements and accreditation will be discussed.

Authors

• Elhadji Mamadou Mbaye, IRESSEF : Institut de Recherche en Santé,de Surveillance Epidemioloque et de Formations

• Philomene Philomene, IRESSEF : Institut de Recherche en Santé,de Surveillance Epidemioloque et de Formations

• Mbaye Moustapha, IRESSEF : Institut de Recherche en Santé,de Surveillance Epidemioloque et de Formations