LONDON: A clinical trial of an experimental vaccine against the deadly Ebola virus is set to start shortly, according to British drugmaker GlaxoSmithKline, which is co-developing the product with US scientists.
The world’s worst outbreak of Ebola has killed nearly 1,000 people in West Africa and the disease could continue spreading for months, increasing pressure on researchers to accelerate their work on new medical interventions. There is no proven cure or vaccine to prevent infection with Ebola.
GSK’s experimental vaccine has already produced promising results in animal studies involving primates and it is now due to enter initial Phase I testing in humans, pending approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
A company spokeswoman said yesterday that the trial should get underway “later this year”, while GSK’s partner the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) said in a statement on its website it would start “as early as fall 2014”.
Reuters
