US to Send 3,000 Troops to Liberia in Expanded Ebola Effort
by VOA News September 16, 2014
President Barack Obama is to announce new measures Tuesday afternoon to help fight the worst-ever Ebola outbreak in West Africa, including sending 3,000 U.S. troops to the region.
A White House statement detailing the program said the troops would be sent to a new command center in Liberia's capital, Monrovia, where they will help with the transportation of supplies and personnel.
The American military will also construct 17 health care facilities of 100 beds each to isolate and treat victims of the virus. The U.S. mission will also set up a facility to train 500 health care workers per week.
US involvement
The White House said the goal of the program is to control the Ebola epidemic at its source, lessen the economic and political toll it takes on the region, and build up 'global health security infrastructure' in West Africa and beyond.
'The goal here is to search American expertise, including our military, logistics and command and control expertise, to try and control this outbreak at its source in west Africa,' Lisa Monaco, Obama's White House counter-terrorism adviser, told MSNBC television on Tuesday ahead of the announcement.
The United States Agency for International Development will also carry out a campaign to hand out protection kits and train people to protect themselves and their families.
It will initially target the 400,000 most vulnerable households in Liberia, and then expand to cover all of Liberia and the region.
The Ebola virus has infected more than 5,000 people in West Africa, spreading from Guinea to Sierra Leone, Liberia, Nigeria and Senegal. Liberia has been the hardest hit, accounting for about half of the more than 2,500 deaths, the World Health Organization reported on Tuesday.
Obama will meet with health experts at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, as well as publicly announce the new U.S. efforts.
US responsibility
The new U.S. push comes after appeals from the region and from aid organizations for a broader U.S. role in combatting the outbreak blamed for more than 2,500 deaths.
The new programs will bring the total U.S. commitment to fighting the Ebola outbreak to $175 million dollars.
Obama administration officials said the cost of the stepped-up effort to combat the disease would come from $500 million in overseas contingency operations, such as the war in Afghanistan, that the Pentagon already has asked Congress to redirect to carry out humanitarian efforts in Iraq and in West Africa, The Associated Press reported.
The officials spoke on condition of anonymity to the AP because they were not authorized to discuss the plans on the record ahead of Obama's announcement.
The officials told the AP it would take about two weeks to get U.S. forces on the ground. The U.S. troops would include medics and corpsmen for treatment and training, engineers to help erect the treatment facilities and specialists in logistics to assist in patient transportation.
UN response
Diplomats said the U.N. Security Council will hold an emergency meeting on the Ebola crisis on Thursday. They say it will only be the second public health crisis discussed by the council, which discussed the AIDS pandemic in 2000.
U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power said the Ebola situation is dire and the international community must work together to stem its spread.
'I don't need to tell any of you how unusual Security Council debates on public health issues and public health crises are, but at this moment it is crucial that council members discuss the status of the epidemic, confer on a coordinated international response, and begin the process of marshaling our collective resources to stop the spread of the disease," Power said.
In a recent interview with NBC's Meet the Press, Obama said while Ebola does not pose an imminent threat to Americans, containing the outbreak is a top national security priority.
Some materials for this report came from Reuters and AP.
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