Trials of three Ebola treatments to begin in West Africa

Accelerated clinical trials of three potential Ebola vaccines will be launched in December in West Africa to hasten the development of a viable treatment for the deadly virus, Doctors Without Borders announced Thursday.

The international humanitarian group said it would host clinical trials starting next month in three Ebola treatment centers using experimental drugs that haven't been through the usual lengthy process of study with animals and healthy people.

Separate trials will be led by three different research partners and involve the U.N. World Health Organization and health officials in affected countries.

"If we're going to find a treatment, we have to do it now — which is why we have to accelerate these trials," Peter Horby, the chief investigator for a trial led by Oxford University, told The Associated Press.

Oxford's trial will test the antiviral drug brincidofovir in Liberia, where President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf said on Thursday she would not seek an extension to a state of emergency imposed in August over Ebola, which has hit the country harder than any other this year.

France's National Institute of Health and Medical Research will conduct a trial of the antiviral drug favipiravir in Gueckedou, Guinea, and the Antwerp Institute of Tropical Medicine will test convalescent whole blood and plasma therapy in Conakry, Guinea.

Results from some of the trials are expected by February or March.

The studies will not use placebo groups and will involve only Ebola patients who give informed consent. Researchers will monitor the patients and collect data on survival rates and other effects. The trials can be stopped early if a treatment begins to show clear benefits or harm.

Doctors Without Borders said the trials are designed to minimize disruption to patients and respect internationally accepted ethical standards with the aim that "sound scientific data will be produced and shared for public good.”

The largest-ever outbreak of Ebola has raged for more than eight months, infecting more than 14,000 people and killing more than 5,000 in West Africa.

Human testing of a handful of experimental drugs and vaccines for Ebola has begun on several continents. The current outbreak kills between 50 and 80 percent of those infected in West Africa, according to Doctors Without Borders.

On Wednesday, Liberia's Sirleaf expressed optimism that her country is moving in the right direction.

"We have now reached the peak of what they call turning the curve, so we are now about to turn the curve," Sirleaf said, noting that 10 of 15 counties reported no new transmissions in recent days.

Wire services