Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Tarik Jasarevic, from the WHO, said there were safety and ethical issues surrounding experimental Ebola drugs 
 
 Global health experts at the World Health Organization (WHO) are meeting to discuss new measures to tackle the Ebola outbreak. 
 
 The meeting is expected to last two days and will decide whether to declare a global health emergency. 
 
 On Wednesday, a man suspected to have contracted Ebola died in Saudi Arabia. If confirmed, this will be the first Ebola-related death outside of Africa. 
 
 The virus has killed nearly 900 people since February in West Africa. 
 
 The outbreak began in February in Guinea, and has since spread to Liberia, Sierra Leone and Nigeria. 
 
 On Wednesday a nurse became the second person to die from Ebola in Nigeria. 
 
 Nigeria's health minister said five other cases of Ebola were being treated in isolation in Lagos, sub-Saharan Africa's largest city. 
 
 It comes as leading infectious disease experts have called for experimental treatments to be offered more widely. 
 
 Two US aid workers who contracted Ebola in Liberia appear to be improving after receiving an unapproved medicine ahead of their evacuation back to the US. 
 
 But it is not clear if the ZMapp drug, which has only been tested on monkeys, can be credited with their improvement. 
 
 Prof Peter Piot, who co-discovered Ebola in 1976, Prof David Heymann, the head of the Centre on Global Health Security, and Wellcome Trust director Prof Jeremy Farrar said there were several drugs and vaccines being studied for possible use against Ebola. 
 
 Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Prof Peter Piot says experimental drugs should be more widely used in Ebola cases 
 
 "African governments should be allowed to make informed decisions about whether or not to use these products - for example to protect and treat healthcare workers who run especially high risks of infection," they wrote in a joint statement. 
 
 The WHO, "the only body with the necessary international authority" to allow such experimental treatments, "must take on this greater leadership role", they said. 
 
 The meeting of the WHO's emergency committee in Geneva is focusing solely on how to respond to the Ebola outbreak. 
 
 If a public health emergency is declared it could also involve detailed plans and efforts to identify, isolate and treat cases. 
 
 It could involve imposing travel restrictions on affected areas. 
 
 A WHO spokesman said: "We can't speculate in advance what the committee members are going to decide in advance." 
 
 Meanwhile, the World Bank is allocating $200m (£120m) in emergency assistance for countries battling to contain Ebola. 
 
 It is the world's deadliest outbreak to date and has centred on Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone. Eight people are currently in quarantine in Nigeria, Africa's most populous country, and two have died there. 
 
 The Saudi man died after showing Ebola symptoms when he returned from a business trip to Sierra Leone, the Saudi health ministry said. 
 
 He died in an isolation ward at a hospital in Jeddah, it added. 
 
 Officials in Liberia said a Spanish priest and two Spanish nuns had been infected in the capital, Monrovia. 
 
 The Spanish government said it would send a plane to repatriate its citizens. 
 
 British Airways has temporarily suspended flights to and from Liberia and Sierra Leone until 31 August because of the health crisis, the airline said in a statement. It follows a similar suspension by two regional airlines last week. 
 
 The virus spreads by contact with infected blood and bodily fluids. The current outbreak is killing between 50% and 60% of people infected. 
 
 There is no cure or vaccine for Ebola - but patients have a better chance of survival if they receive early treatment. 
 
 Ebola has initial flu-like symptoms that can lead to external haemorrhaging from areas like eyes and gums, and internal bleeding which can lead to organ failure. 
 
 Ebola virus disease (EVD) 
 
 Image copyright Science Photo Library 
 
 Symptoms include high fever, bleeding and central nervous system damage 
 
 Fatality rate can reach 90% - but the current outbreak is about 55% 
 
 Incubation period is two to 21 days 
 
 There is no vaccine or cure 
 
 Supportive care such as rehydrating patients who have diarrhoea and vomiting can help recovery 
 
 Fruit bats are considered to be virus' natural host 
 
 Ebola: Experimental treatments 
 
 Why Ebola is so dangerous ||||| RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) — A Saudi national, who fell ill after returning from Sierra Leone, died early Wednesday in his hospital isolation ward where he was being tested for the Ebola virus, said the Saudi Health Ministry. 
 
 The 40-year-old returned on Sunday from Sierra Leone, where there has been an Ebola outbreak, and was then hospitalized in Jiddah after showing symptoms of the viral hemorrhagic fever. 
 
 The patient's samples are being tested in an international reference lab on the advice of the World Health Organization. He had already tested negative for dengue fever. 
 
 Different types of viral hemorrhagic fevers have been found in the kingdom, but the ministry statement said no case of Ebola has ever been detected there. 
 
 Ebola, which has no proven vaccine or treatment, has killed more than 900 people this year in four countries in West Africa. 
 
 Saudi Arabia announced in April that it was not issuing visas this year to Muslim pilgrims from Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea as a precaution to avoid the spread during the hajj pilgrimage, which sees massive crowds of people from around the world gather in Mecca. 
 
 Saudi Ambassador in Guinea Amjad Bedaiwi was quoted in the Saudi Arab News Wednesday saying the decision affects a total of 7,400 pilgrims from those three countries. ||||| MADRID (AP) — Spain has sent a medically-equipped jet to Liberia to bring home a Spanish missionary priest who has tested positive for the Ebola virus, officials said Wednesday. 
 
 The priest, Miguel Pajares, will be treated at a hospital in Madrid after he arrives but public health general director Mercedes Vinuesa did not tell reporters which one. 
 
 Parajes was helping to treat people infected with Ebola and is one of three who tested positive at the San Jose de Monrovia Hospital in Liberia. 
 
 All work for the San Juan de Dios hospital order, a Catholic humanitarian group that runs hospitals around the world. 
 
 The other two infected aid workers were identified as Chantal Pascaline Mutwamene of Congo and Paciencia Melgar from Equatorial Guinea. Three other missionaries working at the hospital tested negative. 
 
 Vinuesa said the Defense Ministry Airbus 310 that will transport Pajares has medical equipment on board to treat more people if needed. 
 
 It's the first time that someone infected with Ebola will be treated in Spain. Vinuesa downplayed possible public health risk concerns during a press conference. 
 
 "The (safety) protocols we will use guarantee minimum risk," she said. ||||| ABUJA, Nigeria (AP) — A Nigerian nurse who treated a man with Ebola is now dead and five others are sick with one of the world's most virulent diseases, authorities said Wednesday as the death toll rose to at least 932 people in four West African countries. 
 
 Nigerian health officials wait to screen passengers at the arrival hall of Murtala Muhammed International Airport in Lagos, Nigeria, Monday, Aug. 4, 2014. Nigerian authorities on Monday confirmed a second... (Associated Press) 
 
 Nigeria health official display a leaflet explaining Ebola Virus Disease at the arrival hall of Murtala Muhammed International Airport in Lagos, Nigeria, Monday, Aug. 4, 2014. Nigerian authorities on... (Associated Press) 
 
 Nigerian health officials wait to screen passengers at the arrivals hall of Murtala Muhammed International Airport in Lagos, Nigeria, Monday, Aug. 4, 2014. Nigerian authorities on Monday confirmed a second... (Associated Press) 
 
 Passengers queue for their passport document check by immigration officers at the arrivals hall of Murtala Muhammed International Airport in Lagos, Nigeria, Monday, Aug. 4, 2014. Nigerian authorities... (Associated Press) 
 
 A Nigerian health official wearing a protective suit waits to screen passengers at the arrivals hall of Murtala Muhammed International Airport in Lagos, Nigeria, Monday, Aug. 4, 2014. Nigerian authorities... (Associated Press) 
 
 Passengers are seen at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport in Lagos, Nigeria, Monday, Aug. 4, 2014. Nigerian authorities on Monday confirmed a second case of Ebola in Africa's most populous country,... (Associated Press) 
 
 The growing number of cases in Lagos, a megacity of some 21 million people, comes as authorities acknowledge they did not treat Patrick Sawyer as an Ebola patient and isolate him for the first 24 hours after his arrival in Nigeria last month. Sawyer, a 40-year-old American of Liberian descent with a wife and three young daughters in Minnesota, was traveling on a business flight to Nigeria when he fell ill. 
 
 The death of the unidentified nurse marks the second Ebola death in Nigeria, and this worries health experts as it is the Africa's most populous country and Lagos, where the deaths occurred, one of its biggest cities. 
 
 Ben Webster, a Red Cross disaster response manager in London, said it is "critically important" that people displaying symptoms are identified quickly. 
 
 "It's impossible to say whether this specific situation could have been avoided, but there is certainly more likelihood of travelers coming from an Ebola-affected country in the region and authorities need to be aware, even if the infrastructure and situation is challenging." 
 
 In Saudi Arabia officials say a man who was being tested for the Ebola virus has died. The 40-year-old returned on Sunday from Sierra Leone, where at least 286 people have died from Ebola, and was then hospitalized in Jiddah after showing symptoms of the viral hemorrhagic fever. 
 
 Spain's Defense Ministry, meanwhile, said a medically-equipped Airbus 310 is ready to fly to Liberia to repatriate a Spanish missionary priest who has Ebola. The ministry said Wednesday that preparations for the flight are being finalized but it is not yet known what time the plane will take off. 
 
 The priest, Miguel Pajares, is one of three missionaries being kept in isolation at the San Jose de Monrovia Hospital in Liberia who have tested positive for the virus, Spain's San Juan de Dios hospital order, a Catholic humanitarian group that runs hospitals around the world, said Tuesday. 
 
 There have now been at least 1,711 cases of Ebola this year, which has no proven vaccine or treatment, according to new figures released Wednesday by the World Health Organization. More than 932 people have died in Sierra Leone, Guinea, Liberia and Nigeria as of Aug. 4, WHO said. In announcing the new deaths, WHO noted in particular that "community resistance remains high" in Liberia. Many fearful family members are refusing to bring sick relatives to isolation centers, preferring to treat them at home and pray for their survival as no proven cure or treatment exists for Ebola. 
 
 The difficulties in quarantining sick people are complicating efforts to stop Ebola's spread. 
 
 In Nigeria, the five people now infected from Sawyer would not have been contagious to their neighbors or family members until they started showing symptoms of their own, health experts say. The delay in enforcing infection control measures, though, is another setback in the battle to stamp out the worst Ebola outbreak in history. 
 
 The specter of the virus spreading through Nigeria is particularly alarming, said Stephen Morse, an epidemiology professor at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health. 
 
 "It makes you nervous when so many people are potentially at risk," he said. 
 
 Lagos is a bewildering combination of wealth and abject poverty, awash in luxury SUVs and decrepit buses alike that carry passengers through hours of crowded traffic on the bridges linking the city's islands to the mainland. 
 
 Ebola can only be transmitted through direct contact with the bodily fluids of someone who is sick — blood, semen, saliva, urine, feces or sweat. Millions live in cramped conditions without access to flushable toilets, and signs posted across the megacity tell people not to urinate in public. 
 
 Authorities in Liberia said Sawyer's sister had recently died of Ebola, though Sawyer said he had not had close contact with her while she was ill. 
 
 In announcing his death, Health Minister Onyebuchi Chukwu maintained that Nigerian officials had been vigilant. 
 
 "It was right there (at the airport) that the problem was noticed because we have maintained our surveillance," he told reporters. "And immediately, he went into the custody of the port health services of the federal ministry of health so there was no time for him to mingle in Lagos. He has not been in touch with any other person again since we took him from the airport." 
 
 On Tuesday, the Lagos state health commissioner said, however, that they did not suspect Ebola immediately and it was only after about 24 hours in the hospital that they identified him as a possible Ebola case. 
 
 "They went back to the history and they were like 'Oh, this is Liberia,' and that's why he was put into isolation," Lagos state health commissioner Jide Idris told reporters. "So even in that window period it was possible that some of these people got infected." 
 
 Nigeria was among the countries present at a regional meeting of health officials in Ghana at the beginning of July where they agreed to step up surveillance of potential Ebola cases and quickly share information with the World Health Organization. 
 
 Sawyer, who had a fever and was vomiting on the plane, was coming from the infected country of Liberia but had a layover in Togo. As a result, officials may not have initially known his original point of departure and it was unclear whether he was traveling on a Liberian or American passport. 
 
 Experts say people infected with Ebola can spread the disease only through their bodily fluids and after they show symptoms. Since the incubation period can last up to three weeks, some of the Nigerians who treated Sawyer are only now showing signs of illness that can mimic many common tropical illnesses — fever, muscle aches and vomiting. 
 
 The national health minister on Wednesday said special tents would be used to speed up the establishment of isolation wards in all of Nigeria's states. Authorities are setting up an emergency center in Lagos to deal with Ebola that will be "fully functional" by Thursday, he said. 
 
 "We are embarking on recruiting additional health personnel to strengthen the team who are currently managing the situation in Lagos," said his statement. 
 
 ___ 
 
 Larson reported from Dakar, Senegal. Associated Press Medical Writers Maria Cheng in London and Mike Stobbe in New York contributed to this report.
– The death toll from the Ebola outbreak in West Africa has risen to 932, the World Health Organization says. Most of the new deaths are coming from Liberia and Sierra Leone. The outbreak emerged in March in Guinea and shows no sign of slowing down. Among the latest news: Nigeria today confirmed the death of a nurse, the country's second death from the illness, the AP reports. Saudi Arabia announced one death of a man with Ebola-like symptoms; it could be the first death outside Africa from the illness. Spain has sent a medically-equipped jet to Liberia to bring home a Spanish missionary priest who has tested positive for the Ebola virus, officials say. The World Health Organization has kicked off two days of meetings to discuss how to address the crisis, the BBC notes.