United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Acting Administrator, Mr. Alfonso Lenhardt has said that the agency will provide $266 million to West African countries affected by the Ebola Outbreak.
This decision was disclosed in a press statement made available to journalists yesterday few days after the International Ebola Recovery Conference at the United Nations Headquarters in New York City.
The statement read “As case numbers continue to drop, and as response efforts continue, the US has also begun to focus on helping countries in West Africa with critical recovery efforts, including improving food security, health systems and non-Ebola health services, governance and economic crisis mitigation, and innovation and communication technology.
“When the first case of Ebola landed in the US, epidemiologists were predicting that the world might soon see a million and a half cases. The US Government responded by providing more than $2 billion for response efforts, including supporting 10,000 civilian responders, providing personal protective equipment, funding and training 1,500 healthcare workers, setting up laboratories, supporting epidemiological surveillance and disease tracing, and launching a massive social messaging.’’