US pledges major Ebola aid surge, slams WHO over delayed alert in Africa outbreak

Pledging a major surge in assistance to contain a fastmoving Ebola outbreak in Central Africa the Trump Administration sharply criticised the World Health Organization WHO for what American officials described as a delayed global alert that may have cost critical response timeSenior US officials said Washington had already committed about USD 23 million in bilateral humanitarian and health assistance and was preparing a much larger package to fund up to 50 Ebola treatment centres and clinics in affected areasldquoThe United States is going to step up in a big wayrdquo one official said adding that the commitment would run into ldquonine figuresrdquo as organisations establish clinics and deploy personnel into the fieldOfficials said the outbreak was centred in a remote conflictaffected region of the Democratic Republic of Congo DRC complicating efforts to identify cases move supplies and deploy respondersldquoWe were late to this because the WHO was a little late to thisrdquo a senior official said during the briefing ldquoOn May 5 they had reports of the viral hemorrhagic fever They didnrsquot effectively track that down and identify that it was an Ebola strain for 10 daysrdquoThe official added that the delay was particularly damaging because ldquothose few days can make a huge differencerdquoUS officials said the WHO confirmed the outbreak publicly only on May 15 after which Washington rapidly mobilised emergency response systems including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention CDC the State Department and humanitarian agenciesThe State Department said it had activated a 24hour task force staffed by officials involved in previous Ebola responses in 2014 and 2018 A Disaster Assistance Response Team DART has also been deployed to the region with personnel heading to Kinshasa and KampalaOfficials confirmed that one person had tested positive so far among individuals linked to US evacuation efforts while several others were being monitored for possible exposureldquoWe have one positive person so farrdquo an official said ldquoThere are eight people that are being evacuatedrdquoThe United States has also imposed strict travel restrictions Under a CDC Title 42 order foreign nationals who have been in the DRC Uganda or South Sudan within the previous 21 days are barred from entering the USHowever officials said the Democratic Republic of Congorsquos national football team would likely still be able to participate in the upcoming FIFA World Cup because the players were already training in Europe and may not fall within the 21day restriction windowUS officials rejected suggestions that reductions in USAID operations weakened outbreak detection systems in AfricaldquoThere was no specific person or program associated with USAID in this region that would have detected thisrdquo one official said calling allegations to the contrary ldquoa lierdquoAnother official said the CDC still maintained a significant footprint in the region including ldquoover 100 CDC staffrdquo in the DRC and more than 30 personnel in Kampala most funded through State Department programmesThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever