Spanish priest infected with Ebola dies in hospital

An elderly Spanish priest infected with Ebola died in a Madrid hospital today, five days after being evacuated from Liberia, a hospital spokeswoman said.

The 75-year-old Roman Catholic priest, Miguel Pajares, was being treated in Spain with an experimental US serum, ZMapp, after being flown to Madrid on August 7.

He contracted Ebola at the Saint Joseph Hospital in the Liberian capital Monrovia where he worked with patients suffering from the disease.

"It is confirmed. He died at 9:28 am," said a spokeswoman for Spain's La Paz-Carlos III hospital.

The priest had been treated with ZMapp, she said.

The medicine arrived at Madrid's La Paz-Carlos III hospital on Saturday after Spain's drug safety agency exceptionally cleared its import to treat the deadly disease.

A panel of medical World Health Organisation experts has determined it is ethical to provide experimental treatments to patients infected with the deadly Ebola virus.

"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 UN's health agency said in a statement today.

Ebola has now claimed four lives in 10 days among the staff of the same Saint Joseph Hospital in Monrovia, which has since been shuttered.

The hospital is run by the Juan Ciudad ONGD charity, which was established by a Spanish Roman Catholic order, the Hospitaller Brothers of St. John of God.

The religious order issued a statement confirming the priest's death.

It thanked the government and people for their support, highlighting the "good work" by hospital staff who treated the priest.

The Roman Catholic order said it would not be making further comment.