GlaxoSmithKline's experimental Ebola vaccine could be tested on patients in clinical safety trials in the US as soon as next week, as the death toll from the deadly virus continues to rise in west Africa.
Britain's largest drug-maker is developing the vaccine with the Vaccine Research Centre of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in the US. Phase-I trials have received the green light from the US health watchdog, the Food and Drug Administration, Bloomberg reported. This is the first test in humans to assess safety and efficacy - whether the drug works in a similar way to how it does in animals.
The Ebola outbreak has killed more than 1,400 people.
Michael Kurilla, director of the Office of Biodefence, Research Resources and Translational Research, told Bloomberg that health authorities are debating whether to give the vaccine to people in west Africa at risk of catching the virus, for which there is no cure. But he added that researchers may need to assess the effect of the vaccine on humans for about a month. The NIH director, Francis Collins, is scheduled to speak on Thursday about the agency's work on Ebola vaccines.
A US drug-maker, NewLink Genetics, based in Iowa, is also working on an Ebola vaccine and has just struck a deal with another firm to manufacture the product and increase its supply, before starting preclinical trials.
Experimental Ebola treatments include ZMapp, made by San Diego-based Mapp Biopharmaceutical. The drug has been given to Will Pooley, the British nurse who contracted the virus in Sierra Leone and has been flown back to London.
