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WHO has announced the list of top emerging diseases likely to cause major epidemics in 2015. The list included viral hemorrhagic fevers like the Crimean Congo hemorrhagic fever, Ebola virus disease, Marburg virus disease, Lassa fever, and Rift Valley fever. WHO has advocated for the initiation or enhancement of the R&D process to develop diagnostics, vaccines, and therapeutics for viral hemorrhagic fevers. Particularly, the 2014 outbreak of Ebola virus disease (EVD) in Western Africa highlighted the need for diagnostics, vaccines, and therapeutics for EVD. Presently, available therapeutics to treat Ebola-infected patients or vaccines to prevent people from acquiring Ebola infection have not yet been approved, while seven diagnostics have been approved for Emergency Use Assessment and Listing procedure by WHO. Some potential therapeutic materials including ZMapp and several candidates of vaccines including VSV-ZEBOV and ChAd3-ZEBIOV are now undergoing clinical trials.
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