The death toll from the Ebola epidemic has climbed above 2,000, the World Health Organisation (WHO) said Friday, as it voiced hopes a vaccine could be available in November.

The deadly virus has claimed 2,097 lives out of 3,944 people infected in Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone, since emerging last December, the UN's health organ said after a two-day crisis meeting in Geneva.

Nigeria has recorded another eight deaths out of 22 cases.

Results from safety trials for two prototype vaccines should be known in November, the WHO added.

Earlier Friday, UN chief Ban Ki-moon set the goal of stopping the worst-ever outbreak of the disease within six to nine months, Yahoo.com reminds.

No licenced vaccine or treatment exist for Ebola, a haemorrhagic fever caused by a virus transmitted through contact with infected body fluids. A number, though, have been tested in animal models and shown promising results.

The two most advanced vaccines -- based on vesicular stomatitis virus and the chimpanzee adenovirus -- will start in Africa and Europe in mid-September, WHO assistant director general Marie-Paule Kieny said.