Ethical questions emerge over who gets Ebola drug

In a development that raises a host of ethical issues, Spain announced it had obtained a scarce US-made experimental Ebola drug to treat a Spanish missionary priest infected with the killer virus. The Health Ministry statement came less than a week after the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said there were virtually no doses available of the drug that was used to treat two Americans with the disease. The drug's maker, Mapp Pharmaceutical Inc. of San Diego, says ‘very little of the drug is currently available’ and that is cooperating with government agencies to increase production as quickly as possible. Nigerian officials say they had asked US health authorities about getting the Ebola drug but were apparently not helped. There is no known cure or licensed treatment for Ebola, which has killed over 960 people in the current outbreak in West Africa. The World Health Organization has called the Ebola outbreak — which emerged in Guinea in March and has since spread to Liberia, Sierra Leone and possibly Nigeria — an international health emergency and urged nations worldwide to battle the disease. The ethical questions surrounding experimental Ebola drugs and vaccines were being debated Monday during a teleconference of medical ethicists and other experts organized by the UN health agency, according to AP.