ACCRA, Ghana (AP) – German Capt. Mattias Reichenbach has loaded protective gear, blankets, mosquito nets, soap and other cargo onto his C-160 military plane and he’s ready to take off on his third mission from the United Nations’ main staging area in Ghana in a war that has claimed thousands of lives in three African countries.
Instead of serving as peacekeepers against insurgents in some bush war, though, the U.N. is battling a different type of deadly foe: Ebola.
Accra, Ghana, which is near the Ebola-hit countries of Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea but has not itself been exposed to the disease, has become the main staging area and headquarters for the U.N. Mission for Ebola Emergency Response, or UNMEER. The establishment in September of what the U.N. describes as its first-ever emergency health mission comes as international efforts against Ebola, which has killed nearly 5,000 people across West Africa, are finally being stepped up.
The World Health Organization warns that there could be 10,000 new Ebola cases a week by December if the world doesn’t get more heavily involved. Cuba sent 165 doctors to Sierra Leone, and 91 more doctors and nurses are joining them. China has already sent nearly 200 medical staff to West Africa and provided other humanitarian aid.
The responses by the United States, Britain and France are largely based on historical or colonial ties. France has focused its efforts on Guinea; Britain on Sierra Leone; and the United States is giving much of its aid to Liberia.