US troops join fight against Ebola in Liberia

World Today

It’s been six weeks since the U.S military started arriving in Liberia as part of “Operation United Assistance,” pledged to help West Africa overcome the Ebola crisis. But as CCTV America’s Katerina Vittozzi reports, the concerns about the virus spread have gone beyond the region and could damage efforts to contain it.

Follow Katerina Vittozzi on Twitter: @kvittozzi

He’s leading the United Nations fight against Ebola. But on his latest trip to Liberia, Anthony Banbury made time to go a Monrovia market and pick up a drink from his homeland. This week two U.S. states placed 21-day quarantines on health-workers returning from treating Ebola in West Africa. Banbury wanted to calm fears about the disease and encourage more health workers to come.

“Come to Liberia and help us get this crisis under control,” Banbury, head of the U.N. Mission for Ebola Emergency Response, said. “We need more people in the streets of Monrovia and throughout the country, getting the crisis under control, ending Ebola, ending it now so the people of this country and the people of the world can be safe. I think there is a lot of irrational fear and panic out there about the realities of life in this city and I wanted to see for myself. It’s perfectly safe to go out and talk to people here in the capital, buy a Coke.”

Nearly every day more supplies and personnel arrive to battle the virus. Six weeks ago, thousands of U.S. troops were pledged to the Ebola fight. Their presence can be seen and heard across the capital adding much-needed logistical support and manpower to the international effort.

“We have engineering, logistics and command capabilities so as the epidemic evolves and they would like us to take on different tasks in different parts of the country. We have a lot of flexibility to move resources and assets,” said Brigadier General Peter Corey, Deputy Commanding General, OUA. “In the last four weeks that plan has changed as the disease has flared in some areas and quietened in others so we’ve had to change which treatment centers we build where and first, so we do have some flexibility.”

The U.S military will hand over a new health care training center in Monrovia this week. That’ll be followed by three new Ebola treatment units. But according to the World Health Organization, supports need to be increased and sustained to fight the crisis. For this, it needs more financial and logistical support. Around 50 new Ebola cases are reported in the capital every day. Medical teams from China and Cuba are already on the ground ready to staff Ebola units in the country. The European Union also promised that it will increase its aid to the region. An advance mission of EU delegates came on a fact-finding mission. Its chief said what he saw answered criticism of the international response.

The European Union says it will decide how much and what sort of aid it’ll provide this week. More than 500 million euros is expected.

Anxiety is escalating in the U.S after an American doctor was diagnosed with Ebola — the first in New York City. Similar unease has spread to the opposite side of the country where the rush is on to find vaccines and treatments — and the money to make it happen. As CCTV America’s Yakenda McGahee reports, San Diego, California is ground zero in this fight.

CCTV America is joined by Robert Murphy, Director of Northwestern University’s Center for Global Health and a professor of medicine and biomedical engineering to talk about federal government’s plans to examine state quarantine policies like the one in New Jersey.