Research in 2014, suggested that favipiravir may have efficacy against Ebola based on studies in mouse models; efficacy in humans was unaddressed.
During the 2014 West Africa Ebola virus outbreak, a French nurse who contracted Ebola while volunteering for Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) in Liberia reportedly recovered after receiving a course of favipiravir. A clinical trial investigating the use of favipiravir against Ebola virus disease began in Guéckédou, Guinea, in December 2014. Preliminary results presented in 2016 at the Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI), later published, showed a decrease in mortality in patients with low-to-moderate levels of virus in blood, but no effect on patients with high levels (the group at a higher risk of death). The trial design was concomitantly criticised for using only historical controls.