Britain has called for greater international help to combat the deadly virus of Ebola which has claimed the lives of more than 3,300 in West Africa.
“We need help from the international community to provide us with the doctors and nurses, so we’re asking other countries to piggy back on the structure we’ve put in place,” Britain’s Foreign Secretary, Philip Hammond said, addressing the “Defeating Ebola” conference began in London Thursday.
“Britain’s got a footprint on the ground in Sierra Leone, we’ve got military engineers there, we’ve got a big DFID presence, we’ve got a plan to roll out a large number of additional Ebola treatment beds,” he said.
The deadly virus has killed nearly 3,338 people so far in the West Africa region, mainly in Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberiaa, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO).
In a sign that the Ebola outbreak ravaging West Africa may spread globally, American health officials have recorded the first patient infected with the deadly virus to be diagnosed in the US.
The WHO said there were few signs of the epidemic being brought under control.
“Transmission remains persistent and widespread in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, with strong evidence of increasing case incidence in several districts,” WHO said.
This came as a leading charity has warned that five people are being infected with the virus every hour in Sierra Leone.
Save The Children says Ebola is “spreading like wildfire across Sierra Leone at a “terrifying rate” with the number of new cases being recorded doubling every few weeks.