The first person has received a new experimental Ebola vaccine.

A 37-year-old man from the UK has become the first person in the world to receive an experimental vaccine against the Ebola virus.

Ed Hunt was given the vaccine in Oxford as the first of 50 healthy volunteers aged 18 to 55 taking part in an early-stage clinical trial.

Hunt said he was inspired to volunteer after watching news coverage of the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

“I had wanted to volunteer for the Covid vaccine trial but was unable to because of work commitments. After seeing news from DR Congo I thought I’d like to do my bit,” he told the BBC.

The vaccine was developed by scientists at the University of Oxford in just eight weeks using the same platform that was used to create the Oxford–AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine, which was administered to hundreds of millions of people during the pandemic.

Professor Teresa Lambe, who leads the Oxford Ebola vaccine team, said the rapid development was possible because of decades of previous research.

The phase one trial is designed to assess the vaccine’s safety and determine whether it generates a strong immune response. Researchers stressed that participants cannot contract Ebola from the vaccine.

“We will not be giving anybody Ebola in this trial or any trial,” Prof Lambe said. “The aim of the phase one clinical study is to look for the safety of the vaccine, and also to see if we’re getting a strong immune response that could be protective against the Bundibugyo species of Ebola.”

The vaccine targets the Bundibugyo strain of Ebola, which is responsible for the current outbreak. Although four vaccines against this strain are in development, this is the first to reach human trials. An approved vaccine already exists for the Zaire strain of Ebola, but it does not protect against Bundibugyo.

The Oxford team plans to launch a second, smaller trial in Uganda before carrying out a larger efficacy study in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

The Serum Institute of India has already produced 600,000 doses of the vaccine, which could be deployed if the trials prove successful.

To date, the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo has resulted in more than 2,500 confirmed cases and just over 1,000 deaths.