The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is reportedly still trying to fund a vaccine trial in Guinea-Bissau that health experts have condemned as unethical. According to a Rolling Stone report cited by Ars Technica, staff in the CDC director's office told the agency's budget office in late September to reserve $1.6 million for the study. The money would come from CDC global health security programs, which could otherwise support efforts such as fighting the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
The trial, led by Danish researchers Christine Stabell Benn and Peter Aaby, would enroll 14,000 newborns and withhold a hepatitis B vaccine from half of them. The World Health Organization said in a February rebuke that withholding the vaccine is unethical, since the birth dose is proven and is the standard of care. Guinea-Bissau suspended the trial in January pending ethical and technical reviews. The researchers argue that because newborns there are not currently routinely vaccinated, withholding the dose is acceptable.
A revised design now asks mothers about hepatitis B infection and tests a small fraction, but outside experts still object to the unvaccinated group. The University of Southern Denmark has approved the revised design, and a dean said the Guinea-Bissau ethics committee signed off, leaving government authorization as the final step. The trial remains on hold. The Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees the CDC, did not respond to a request for comment from Ars Technica. Advocacy group Stand Up for Science has vowed to block the trial again, calling it a "gross violation of human rights."