US to fund 50 Ebola treatment clinics in DRC, Uganda

The United States said Tuesday it is committing to rapidly supporting the Ebola outbreak response by funding up to 50 treatment clinics, and associated frontline costs being established in Ebola-affected regions of the DRC and Uganda. These rapidly deployed clinics will enable implementing partners to establish clinical care and containment perimeters around affected areas, and Clinics will provide emergency Ebola screening, triage, and isolation capacity, said the State Department in a press release. This U.S. funding commitment will accelerate the delivery of frontline medical care, life-saving humanitarian assistance, and critical outbreak response capabilities to communities at greatest risk, it added. "Incremental rapid U.S. funding will stimulate the expansion of emergency treatment capacity, strengthen field operations, and accelerate the delivery of protective equipment, diagnostics, and essential health services where they are needed most," it noted. "We know from previous outbreak response that ensuring partners rapidly scale up containment and treatment efforts in the affected regions is the most critical variable to ensuring an effective response and that the disease does not spread," according to the release. It underlined that this additional funding announcement, in the first days of the epidemic, should send a clear message: the United States has an ironclad commitment to ensuring this response is fully resourced, rapid, and cooperative between key global health and humanitarian partners. The US will deliver this funding primarily via Central Emergency Response Funds (CERF) pooled funding vehicles administered by the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), it added. The Department of State affirmed that it continues to work closely with the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), the lead federal agency for this response, to mobilize US global resources in support of this outbreak response.