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FREETOWN — Sierra Leone yesterday lifted crippling nationwide restrictions on movement put in place at the height of the Ebola crisis, amid signs that the deadly epidemic was retreating. “Restrictions on movement will be eased to support economic activity. As such, there will no longer be any district or chiefdom level restrictions on movement,” President Ernest Bai Koroma said in an address to the nation late on Thursday.

The west African nation of six million has restricted travel for around half its population, sealing off six of its 14 districts and numerous tribal chiefdoms since announcing a state of emergency in July in response to an outbreak which has killed more than 3,000 Sierra Leoneans.

Koroma pointed to a “steady downward trend” in new cases in recent weeks, adding that “victory is in sight” but cautioning against complacency.

The president said the travel bans would be removed from Friday and restrictions will be eased on Saturday trading hours in the hard-hit Western Area, which includes the capital Freetown.

Meanwhile, US health officials have said that they are planning to start larger, decisive clinical trials in Liberia in the next two weeks to determine if two new Ebola treatments under development are safe and effective.

One of the treatments is being developed by GlaxoSmithKline and another by Newlink Genetics Corp with Merck & Co.

The US government and leading drug makers have accelerated their efforts to bring a vaccine or treatment to market since the Ebola outbreak reached crisis proportions in West Africa last year. That includes speeding to human trials treatments that had only been tested in non-human primates.

The treatments are advancing even as the World Health Organisation said the epidemic in West Africa appears to be ebbing.

There have been 21,724 cases of Ebola reported in nine countries in the past year since the epidemic began in Guinea, including 8,641 deaths, according to the latest WHO figures.

The officials, speaking on a conference call, also said that they expect to soon start phase 1 and phase 2 clinical trials — an earlier stage than the trials for the other two treatments — of the ZMapp Ebola virus treatment that is being developed by privately held Mapp Biopharmaceutical Inc.

They said they believe they have produced enough ZMapp to supply the trials, which are awaiting approval from the US Food and Drug Administration and will likely start two to three weeks later.

Director of the US government’s Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, Dr Robin Robinson, said it expects to have thousands of doses of the ZMapp drug available by the end of the year for commercial use if the treatment is proved effective in the trials.

In Liberia, about 27,000 people are expected to take part in the trial for the treatments from GlaxoSmithKline, Merck and NewLink.

In Sierra Leone, where the officials said they are also considering moving forward with a trial, they are targeting healthcare workers and expect to include about 6,000 people. Sierra Leone has yet to decide which treatment would be used in that trial, the officials said.— AFP-Yahoo.