Ebola Patient Kent Brantly To Be Released From Atlanta Hospital; Nancy Writebol Too Maybe Released

Atlanta’s Emory University Hospital announced Thursday that at least one of the two American patients who are being treated for the Ebola virus with the experimental drug ZMapp, will be released from the hospital Thursday.

Emory Hospital will hold a press conference to discuss the release of the two patients --Dr. Kent Brantly and Nancy Writebol -- who are being treated for the contagious disease, which has killed 1,350 people and has infected more than 2,500 people so far. Brantly, who was working for Samaritan's Purse in Liberia when he contracted the virus, will be released Thursday, Associated Press, or AP, reported citing the charity's spokesperson. However, it was not clear when Writebol would be discharged.

"Today I join all of our Samaritan's Purse team around the world in giving thanks to God as we celebrate Dr. Kent Brantly's recovery from Ebola and release from the hospital," Franklin Graham, president of Samaritan's Purse, said, according to AP.

Brantly and Writebol were airlifted out of Monrovia earlier this month, after they had contracted the disease while working at a missionary clinic. Both of them are being treated in isolation with the experimental drug ZMapp, manufactured by Mapp Biopharmaceuticals, which had not been tested on humans before the current outbreak of the virus, the deadliest one since it was discovered in 1976.

The drug has since been used on three doctors in Liberia, who also are said to be recovering. Last week, a Spanish priest, Miguel Pajares, died in a hospital in Madrid before he could be administered ZMapp.

Ebola spreads through direct contact with the infected person or dead bodies of victims, or through contact with bodily fluids.