Knowledge, Attitudes and Practices towards Ebola Virus Disease among Participants in an Ebola Vaccine Trial in Dakar, Senegal

The 2014 Ebola outbreak in West Africa was the trigger to mobilize efforts in order to promptly obtain safe and effective vaccine. The objectives of this survey conducted during an Ebola vaccine trial were assessing the knowledge, attitudes and practices of participants about Ebola and vaccine and determining the association of key sociodemographic characteristics with knowledge of transmission mode, reservoir, stigma and hand washing. A cross sectional study was designed and a semi-closed questionnaire was used to collect data of the 250 participants. The main identified sources of information were television and radio. The motivations for being part of the study were confidence in doctors (79.6%) and example given by the medical staff (75.6%). Knowledge of transmission mode was low among respondents (22.1%) while that on the reservoir was rather high (73.8%). Stigma was noted in 49.2% of participants. Behavioural change through hand washing was adopted in 74.4% of respondents. Factors associated with knowledge of transmission mode were age group, urban origin, marital status and education level. Fear and geographic origin were associated to stigma and hand washing. To better prevent and control the spread of Ebola virus disease, a focus needs to be placed on modes of transmission and hand washing, and health personnel could play a major role in improving the acceptability of the vaccine.