Washington: US President Barack Obama Wednesday paid honour to healthcare workers who have treated Ebola patients in West Africa, calling them "heroes" deserving to be applauded rather than discouraged.

"All of them have signed up to leave their homes and their loved ones to head straight into the heart of the Ebola epidemic," Xinhua quoted Obama as saying. "They do this for no other reason than their own sense of duty ... We need to call them what they are, which is American heroes."