GENEVA, Switzerland: The death toll from the Ebola epidemic in the West African countries of Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea has now risen to over 3,000, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced.
The UN health agency said that according to data received up to September 23, at least 3,091 out of 6,574 probable, suspected and confirmed cases died.
The WHO officials said that the world’s worst Ebola epidemic in history may kill tens of thousands of people.
Two Ebola vaccines will be ready by early 2015: WHO
Meanwhile, the WHO assistant director general Marie-Paule Kieny said that two experimental vaccines to cure the fatal Ebola virus will be ready by 2015.
Kieny said that the WHO is currently collaborating with the British company GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) and the American group NewLink Genetics to accelerate the process of clinical tests and production of Ebola vaccines.
“If everything goes well, we may be able to begin using some of these vaccines in some of the affected countries at the very beginning of next year,” Kieny said.
