Netizens are warned not to believe the viral story that first appeared in a satire Web site The News Nerd, claiming that the "Ebola vaccine only works on white people." The article claimed its source was the Centres for Disease Control, but there were no official reports suggesting the so-called "report" to be true.

The article said the CDC has released a statement and declared the trial vaccine against Ebola will only be effective on people with "white skin." The satire piece claimed the Ebola vaccine was developed by ThomasSmithCharles. It went on to mention that the vaccine uses the virus strain taken from a West Nile monkey, known as ape multivirus type 5, to deliver "benign genetic material" of the Ebola strain that currently ravages West Africa.

To its credit, the Web site has posted a disclaimer saying it should not be taken seriously since it does not post "real news." However, many people have shared the article online and believed it to be true. The fake report is accompanied by an image taken from earlier news stories of Ebola. For people who have read about the story, it is best to not share the article further to avoid confusion. Netizens are advised to verify the credibility of the source to ensure a certain report is real or not.

Meanwhile, Reuters has reported that scientists continue to fight with ethics to release a viable vaccine for Ebola as soon as possible. It would normally take years for a vaccine to be proven safe and effective. However, the rapid spread of the Ebola virus in West Africa has called for a quick response to stop hundreds of people from possibly dying every day.

Health authorities are determined to release a potential Ebola vaccine in the coming months. They are eager to get rid of the usual testing while raising unprecedented ethical questions in the process. Adrian Hill, a professor and director of Britain's Jenner Institute at the University of Oxford, said there are still deployment issues surrounding the Ebola vaccine that no one can answer yet. Hill is also conducting trials on healthy volunteers for an experimental Ebola vaccine developed by GlaxoSmithKline.

Even if the experimental drug is found to be safe, it would take years to prove it is effective. Health experts say time is the only thing Ebola patients don't have. The World Health Organisation has previously predicted that about 20,000 people would be infected by the virus by November.

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