Ebola Vaccine Tested On Two Women

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| abc news, Dr. Anthony Fauci, Ebola outbreak, Ebola vaccine, gambia, mali, Nation and World, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, NIH, oxford university, West Africa

Niki Hashemi | 

September 4, 2014 | 5:27 a.m. PDT

Web Producer

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Ebola vaccine is being tested on two women in a fast-tracked clinical trial (Twitter/@YahooNews)

In a report released by the World Health Organization, the Ebola outbreak in West Africa has claimed the lives of more than 1,900 people.

To meet the demand for an effective Ebola vaccine, a fast tracked clinical trial was initiated to test a drug that could potentially prevent Ebola from infecting the body. Currently, two women have been injected with the experimental vaccine.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases at the NIH, said, “There is an urgent need for a protective Ebola vaccine, and it important to establish that a vaccine is safe and spurs the immune system to react in a way necessary to protect against infection.”

Additional Ebola vaccine trials will be held in September at the University of Oxford in England, and centers in Gambia and Mali. These trials will test around 140 more patients.