Obama Plans Major Anti- Ebola Drive
President Obama is planning to give a boost to the U.S. efforts in alleviating the Ebola epidemic in West Africa.
Obama will likely elaborate on the strategy on a visit to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta Tuesday, sources familiar with the matter said.
Some of the measures Obama may undertake are sending extra portable hospitals, doctors, medical supplies and giving training to health workers in Liberia and other countries, sources said, reports The Wall Street Journal.
Obama is also predicted to ask the Congress to consent to the appeal he made some days ago asking for an additional $88 million to fight Ebola.
"There's a lot that we've been putting toward this, but it is not sufficient," said, Obama's counterterrorism adviser, Lisa Monaco on Sunday. "So the president has directed a more scaled-up response and that's what you're going to hear more about on Tuesday," she said.
Obama's plan consists of four key components: Managing the outbreak at its starting place in West Africa; making the region's public health system more efficient; boosting the capability of local officials by giving better training for health care providers and augmenting support from organizations like the United Nations and World Health Organization.
Last week, Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf had requested Obama for urgent aid for fighting the disease. She had said that without the American aid, Liberia would plunge into civil chaos.
"I am being honest with you when I say that at this rate, we will never break the transmission chain and the virus will overwhelm us," the Liberian President wrote in a letter to Obama , reports The New York Times.
