theSIGNAL SCIENCE
4 June 2026
"A crisis is just a problem we chose to notice too late."
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Science

The Ebola Strain Nobody Prepared For

A neglected Ebola variant is spreading in Central Africa, and the world is scrambling to build a vaccine it should have made years ago.

Picture a clock on a wall in Kinshasa. Every tick, Dr Richard Hatchett reminds us, matters. "Every day counts in the race against this deadly disease," the chief executive of the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) said on Monday, when his organisation announced $60 million in emergency funding for three vaccine developers. The target is the Bundibugyo strain of Ebola — a variant that, unlike its more famous cousin the Zaire strain, currently has no approved vaccine and no treatment at all.

The outbreak is active in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and has crossed into Uganda, while armed militias in the region have attacked Ebola treatment centres, making it extraordinarily difficult to even begin clinical trials. So who is actually building something? Two candidates are leading the race. The International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI) is developing the rVSV Bundibugyo vaccine, which uses the same platform as Ervebo — the only approved Ebola vaccine, which works against the Zaire strain.

The World Health Organization has called IAVI's candidate the "most promising" option, though it is not expected to be ready for clinical trials for another seven to nine months.

Photo: Braňo / Unsplash
An Ebola treatment centre in eastern DRC, where conflict has made medical access dangerously difficult.
Discuss
  • Why do you think Bundibugyo Ebola vaccines were not developed and stockpiled after the 2014–16 outbreak?
  • What specific challenges do armed conflicts create for scientists trying to run clinical trials in a region?
  • The Oxford vaccine might be ready faster, but WHO wants more animal data. How should researchers balance speed and safety during an outbreak?
  • Is it fair that vaccine development often only accelerates when wealthy countries feel threatened? Who should decide global health priorities?
  • If you were advising a government on pandemic preparedness, what one change would you make based on this story?
Science

Vaccine doubt papers pulled after years of warnings

Three scientific papers that fuelled vaccine hesitancy in the United States have been retracted, removed, or placed under investigation — some of them years after researchers first sounded the alarm about their flawed methods. Robert F Kennedy Jr, America's health secretary and a long-standing anti-vaccine voice, cited two of the studies in a 2023 book claiming unvaccinated children were healthier. …
  • Should journals be penalised when they take years to retract flawed studies?
∞
The technologies to make an efficacious Bundibugyo vaccine are available to us, but we need to do the work to demonstrate that they do work.
Mark Feinberg, President, International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI)
Science

A Comet From Elsewhere Smells Different

On December 15, NASA's James Webb Space Telescope pointed at comet 3I/ATLAS — a visitor from outside our solar system — and sniffed something strange: methane, buried deep beneath the surface, only released after solar heat finally reached it. The ratios are all wrong, in the most delightful way. …
  • Does finding unusual chemistry on 3I/ATLAS change how you think about our solar system's uniqueness?
AMERICAS · Science
Debugging: Google requests permission to release 32m mosquitoes in California and Florida
GLOBAL · Science
Smart drug that strips cancer cells of ‘invisibility cloak’ can shrink tumours by 30%, trial shows
WORLD · Science
Weight-loss drugs can cut breast cancer risk by up to 30%, studies suggest
OCEANIA · Science
A stellar “Rosetta stone” reveals the source of mysterious cosmic signals
theSIGNAL IN THE LAB
1VOCABULARY
strainstockpiled
hesitancyretractedpredetermined
efficaciousinterstellar
2GRAMMAR FOCUS
Dependent prepositions — verb/adjective + preposition patterns
Many verbs and adjectives in English are followed by a fixed preposition that cannot be changed. For example, 'rely on', 'responsible for', and 'different from' always use the same preposition regardless of context.
for · against · from · about · on · into · of
  1. Scientists are warning the dangers of ignoring calls to develop vaccines for multiple Ebola strains.
  2. The Bundibugyo strain is different the Zaire strain in that it currently has no approved vaccine.
  3. CEPI announced $60 million in emergency funding to prepare the growing Bundibugyo outbreak.
  4. The outbreak in the DRC has crossed Uganda, raising fears of a wider regional crisis.
  5. Researchers are still waiting more animal-study data before trials of the Oxford vaccine can begin.
  6. Dr Karina Top accused the authors making their data fit a predetermined conclusion.
  7. The chemical ratios found in comet 3I/ATLAS suggest it was forged in an environment completely different our solar system.
3DEPENDENT PREPOSITIONS
Complete each phrase with the correct preposition. All from today's articles.
  1. Scientists called ___ vaccines to be stockpiled after the 2014–16 outbreak.
  2. The Oxford vaccine is built ___ the same technology as the AstraZeneca COVID-19 jab.
  3. WHO experts are waiting ___ more animal-study data before proceeding.
  4. Methane is far more abundant relative ___ water than in typical comets.
  5. RFK Jr cited two studies ___ a book claiming unvaccinated children were healthier.
  6. The outbreak has crossed ___ Uganda from the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
4CRITICAL THINKING
All three articles touch on the consequences of ignoring early warnings — whether about unstockpiled vaccines, flawed research, or the chemistry of interstellar objects. In what ways are the failures described in the Ebola and vaccine retraction stories similar in nature, and where do they fundamentally differ in terms of who is responsible?
5CREATIVE · HEADLINES
Write a headline for the top story in each of the following styles. One line each, no explanation:
  • TABLOID NEWSPAPER
  • LUXURY MAGAZINE
  • ACTIVIST BLOG
6WRITING
The articles reveal that both the Ebola preparedness gap and the slow retraction of flawed vaccine studies involved years of ignored warnings from experts. Write a short opinion piece arguing what structural changes — in funding, publishing, or policy — could make institutions respond to expert warnings more quickly.
7DEGREES OF EXTREMITY
Complete each ladder from mild to strong.
  • concerned→→
  • uncertain→→
  • difficult→→
  • promising→→
  • unusual→→
  • rising→→
  • warning→→
8SPEAKING
  1. How should scientists communicate vaccine uncertainty to the public?
  2. Which matters more: speed of approval or strength of evidence?
  3. What does 3I/ATLAS suggest about life existing elsewhere in space?
  4. Can international health bodies like WHO move fast enough in emergencies?
  5. Should individuals trust retracted studies that confirm their existing beliefs?