Trial of Canadian Ebola drug stopped; no overall benefit shown from TKM Ebola

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TORONTO – A Canadian company that had been developing an Ebola drug says a clinical trial of the experimental product has been stopped.

Tekmira Pharmaceuticals says the trial was halted because it seemed clear that continuing was not likely to show that the drug works.

The drug is called TKM-Ebola. It was being tested with Ebola patients in Sierra Leone.

Dr. Peter Horby, the chief investigator of the trial, says the drug has not been shown to benefit patients.

Horby says data from the trial still need to be analyzed.

Horby is with the University of Oxford, which was conducting the trial. The research was funded by Britain’s Wellcome Trust charity.