Scientists are to fast-track tests on a third possible Ebola vaccine, as the world’s worst outbreak of the deadly virus accelerates research efforts.<br /><br />Healthcare giant Johnson & Johnson says its clinical trials have been brought forward to early next year.<br /><br />The race to develop new drugs has been spurred by a World Health Organisation ruling that it is ethical to use experimental products, given this epidemic’s high death toll.<br /><br />“This Ebola epidemic is the largest and most severe and most complex we have ever seen in the nearly 40 year history of this disease,” Margaret Chan, director-general of the World Health Organisation (WHO), told reporters at a Washington news conference.<br /><br />“No-one, even outbreak responders with experience dating back to 1976, to 1995, people that were directly involved with those outbreaks, none of them have ever seen anything like it.”<br /><br />Ebola has claimed more than 1,900 lives in West Africa since March. <br /><br />The WHO has invited experts to Geneva on Thursday to discuss experimental treatments and vaccines and how testing can be fast-tracked to help those in need.
