A Spanish priest who became the first person carrying the deadly Ebola virus to be brought back to Europe for treatment has died in a Madrid hospital.
Miguel Pajares, 75, died at the Carlos III Hospital, where he was being treated, a spokeswoman confirmed.
A convoy of medics in protective suits escorted the missionary back to Spain last week after he was repatriated on a specially-adapted Airbus plane from Liberia in west Africa.
Spain's Health Ministry said yesterday that it had obtained a course of the U.S.-made experimental drug ZMapp over the weekend to treat the priest.
The Madrid hospital would not confirm if he had been given the drug at the time of his death.
His body will be cremated tomorrow to avoid any further public health risks, the hospital added.
Mr Parajes had worked for the San Juan de Dios hospital order, a Spain-based Catholic humanitarian group, and had been helping to treat people with Ebola in Liberia.
He had worked as a missionary in Africa for nearly five decades and was due to return to Spain for good in September.
Speaking before he was flown back he said: 'I'd like to return because we have a very bad experience of what's happened here.
'We are abandoned. We want to go to Spain and be treated like people.'
The priest was brought back to Spain alongside a nun, who was also suspected of being infected with the virus.
However, she tested negative for the disease.
When the priest first arrived in Madrid, there were claims he was on a drip and was unable to walk unaided with his condition being described as stable.
Mr Pajares was working at a hospital in Liberia, which is run by a Catholic humanitarian group he is involved in
The missionary was flown back to Spain for treatment after he tested positive for the deadly virus, which is sweeping West Africa
It was said he wasn't showing signs of bleeding, which is a symptom of an advanced stage of the illness.
The priest's brother Emilio said he was 'worried but happy' about the transfer amid concerns within Spain that the nation's hospitals may not successfully contain the illness.
His death comes as Turkey was put on alert over the virus after the country's health ministry said a passenger from Nigeria was taken to hospital after arriving at Istanbul airport with a high fever.
The ministry said it did not know if the female passenger had Ebola but they were taking precautions.
The Turkish Airlines plane, which was supposed to travel on to Barcelona, was then disinfected.
Meanwhile it has been confirmed that Liberia is set to receive doses of the experimental drug to treat the condition, which will be given to two sick doctors.
When the priest first arrived in Madrid, there were claims he was on a drip and was unable to walk unaided with his condition being described as stable
Speaking before he was flown back he said: 'I'd like to return because we have a very bad experience of what's happened here
The news comes after a the World Health Organisation declared it is ethical to use unproven Ebola drugs and vaccines in the current outbreak in West Africa provided the right conditions are met.
Its statement, however, sidestepped the key question of how to decide who should get the limited drugs.
'In the particular circumstances of this outbreak and provided certain conditions are met, the panel reached consensus that it is ethical to offer unproven interventions with as yet unknown efficacy and adverse effects, as potential treatment or prevention,' the agency said.
The doctors will become the first African patients to receive the drug.
The U.S. government had put Liberian officials in touch with the California-based maker of ZMapp, Mapp Biopharmaceutical.
The company said that in responding to a request from an unidentified West African country, it had ran out of its supply of the treatment.
When he was brought back to Spain last week, a convoy of vehicles escorted him to the King Carlos III hospital for treatment
He was flown back to Europe on a specially adapted plane provided by the Spanish Defence Ministry
Spain's Health Ministry said yesterday that it had obtained a course of the U.S.-made drug ZMapp over the weekend to treat the priest
The treatment is so new that it has not been tested for safety or effectiveness in humans and the company has said it would take months to produce even modest quantities.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services confirmed: 'The U.S. government assisted in connecting the government of Liberia with the manufacturer.
'Since the drug was shipped for use outside the US, appropriate export procedures had to be followed.'
In the past few weeks, the experimental drug was given to two American aid workers, Nancy Writebol and Dr Kent Brantly who were diagnosed with the disease while working at a hospital that treated Ebola patients in Liberia.
They were given the drug after being airlifted back to the U.S.
It has now emerged that Mrs Writebol's husband David has now been quarantined after returning to America from Liberia.
Mr Writebol and two other missionaries are not showing any symptoms of the deadly virus but will be kept in isolation in Charlotte, North Carolina.
David Writebol, with his wife Nancy, who has been infected with the Ebola virus. Mr Writebol himself has now been quarantined
The three quarantined men will live in motor homes in their mission's RV park along with eight others, including six children, until they have gone three weeks since thier last contact with the infected.
They must stay three feet from each other at all times, and 'can't hug', Bruce Johnson, president of the SIM USA mission, said.
The Americans are said to be improving, but there is no way to know whether the drug helped or if they are getting better on their own, as others have as around 40 per cent of those infected with Ebola are surviving the current outbreak.
Mrs Writebol's son Jeremy says he has been able to see his mother twice a day through a window in a special ward of Emory University Hospital and says he has noticed a remarkable change since she first returned from Liberia last week.
He said: 'She's been doing well,' Jeremy said. 'We've just seen her get physically better. Her eyes brighten up, her countenance goes up. [She's] smiling, even joking a little bit.'
In Sierra Leone, patients are staying away from hospital wards, gripped with fear that they will contract the Ebola virus
A health worker cleans his hands before entering an Ebola screening tent at the Kenema Government Hospital in Sierra Leone
But giving the drug to the Westerners, who were then airlifted back to their home countries has caused growing anger in Africa.
'There's no reason to try this medicine on sick white people and to ignore blacks,' said Marcel Guilavogui, a pharmacist in Conakry, Guinea.
'We understand that it's a drug that's being tested for the first time and could have negative side-effects. But we have to try it in blacks too.'
Meanwhile some were using Twitter to demand that the drug be made available.
'We can't afford to be passive while many more die,' said Aisha Dabo, a Senegalese-Gambian journalist who was tweeting using the hashtag GiveUsTheSerum.
'That's why we raise our voice for the world to hear us.'
Health workers wear protective clothing and masks as they treat patients suspected to have the virus
An ambulance leaves an Ebola isolation unit carrying the bodies of Ebola victims to a burial site
A Sierra Leone official said the country had not asked for the drug, but the other governments said they wanted any treatment that might help patients recover, despite the risks of unproven medicines.
'The alternative for not testing this is death, a certain death,' Liberia's information minister Lewis Brown said before the announcement.
Meanwhile Guinea has also said it wants doses of the drug.
'Guinean authorities would naturally be interested in having this medicine,' said Alhoussein Makanera Kake, spokesman for the government committee fighting Ebola.
Ebola is spread through direct contact with the blood or bodily fluids of a sick person.
It begins with symptoms including fever and sore throat and can escalate to vomiting, diarrhoea and internal and external bleeding.
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