WHO Shuts Down Clinic In Sierra Leone After Aid Worker Gets Ebola

The World Health Organization announced Tuesday that it had shut down one of its health clinics in Sierra Leone after an aid worker became infected with the rapidly-spreading Ebola virus.

Although the WHO said in a statement that withdrawing one of its staff members from a testing clinic in Kailahun was only temporary, the closing of the clinic could make it more difficult to stop the spreading virus, as it is one of two laboratories in the West African country that tests for the virus.

"It's a temporary measure to take care of the welfare of our remaining workers," WHO spokesperson Christy Feig told Reuters, although she did not specify how long the clinic would be closed for. "After our assessment, they will return."

The deadly Ebola virus has been spreading through West Africa for the past five months, killing over 1,400 and infecting over 2,600. Several West African countries, including Sierra Leone and Nigeria, have declared national states of health emergency as the countries grasp for resources and aid workers to help stop the virus.

The United Nations gave one pharmaceutical company in the U.S. the green light to begin sending an experimental Ebola drug to West Africa to treat the epidemic. Although the drug has been mostly tested on monkeys, the U.N. said in a statement earlier this month that the desperate status of the Ebola outbreak calls for unconventional measures.

A spokesperson for the UN's World Health Organization confirmed earlier in August that a 12-person ethics panel had voted unanimously to approve the distribution of experimental drugs, saying "There was unanimous agreement among the experts that in the special circumstances of this Ebola outbreak it is ethical to offer unregistered interventions as potential treatments or prevention."