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OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — The Nebraska doctors treating an American aid worker battling Ebola have identified the experimental drug they used.
Dr. Phil Smith of the Nebraska Medical Center says Dr. Rick Sacra received a Tekmira Pharmaceuticals drug called TKM-Ebola for a week after he arrived in Omaha on Sept. 5.
Sacra continues to improve, and doctors said Monday that he may be well enough to leave the hospital's isolation unit soon.
But Dr. Angela Hewlett said it's not clear what role the experimental drug played in Sacra's recovery because he also received a blood transfusion from an Ebola survivor and other treatments.
The 51-year-old Rick Sacra from Worcester, Massachusetts, contracted Ebola while working at a hospital in Liberia.
The Ebola virus is being blamed for more than 2,800 deaths in West Africa.
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