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Ebola Experts Call For Release Of Experimental Drug In Africa

Sara Newman |
August 6, 2014 | 9:30 a.m. PDT

Deputy Editor

Questions arise about who gets treatment for ebola virus in West Africa (European Commission DG ECHO/Creative Commons)
Questions arise about who gets treatment for ebola virus in West Africa (European Commission DG ECHO/Creative Commons)
On Wednesday three of the world's preeminent Ebola experts called for the use of experimental drugs in Africa.

With nearly a thousand deaths to date, the experts are not advocating a widespread dispersal of the experimental treatment, but rather the creation of a process by which the individual African governments can make the treatment available in certain cases. 

This advice comes in the wake of a controversial decision to give two American health workers in Liberia access to the treatment, while doctors and nurses throughout Africa have been dying in their attempts to treat the deadly virus. 

UPDATE: The World Health Organization (WHO) announced that a panel of medical ethicists would meet next week to consider expanding access to the experimental Ebola treatment. 

Contact Deputy Editor Sara Newman here. Follow her on Twitter here



 

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