Cuba sending hundreds of doctors, nurses to fight Ebola in West Africa

Electron micrograph of an Ebola virus virion. Image from CDC/Cynthia Goldsmith / Public Health Image Library / Wikimedia Commons.

LONDON—Cuba’s health ministry says it is sending more than 160 health workers to help stop the raging Ebola outbreak in Sierra Leone, providing a much-needed injection of medical expertise in a country where health workers are in short supply.

In a briefing on Friday, World Health Organization chief Dr. Margaret Chan said the agency was “extremely grateful” for the help.

Ebola is believed to have killed more than 2,200 people in West Africa so far, the biggest-ever outbreak of the lethal virus.

So far, the death rate is about 50 per cent. Doctors and nurses are at high risk of catching Ebola, spread via the exchange of bodily fluids.

Cuba will be sending experienced doctors, nurses and other scientists to Sierra Leone in early October. They will stay for six months.