A panel of medical experts has determined it is ethical to provide experimental treatments to patients infected with the deadly Ebola virus, the World Health Organization said Tuesday as the global death toll topped 1,000.
“In the particular circumstances of this outbreak, and provided certain conditions are met, the panel reached consensus that it is ethical to offer unproven interventions with as yet unknown efficacy and adverse effects, as potential treatment or prevention,” the UN’s health agency said in a statement.
The panel’s report came shortly after an elderly Spanish priest infected with Ebola died in a Madrid hospital on Tuesday, five days after being evacuated from Liberia.
The 75-year-old Roman Catholic priest, Miguel Pajares, had been treated in Spain with the experimental US serum called ZMapp after being flown to Madrid on August 7. He contracted the virus at the Saint Joseph Hospital in the Liberian capital Monrovia where he worked.