Five ambulances were donated by the United States to help Sierra Leone fight the Ebola outbreak after the West African government said it can take up to 24 hours to pick up bodies, according to The Associated Press.
Kathleen FitzGibbon from the U.S. Embassy in Sierra Leone handed President Ernest Bai Koroma the keys to five ambulances Wednesday after the U.S. spent more than $100 million responding to the outbreak, the AP reported. "Together we will win this fight," Koroma told her.
Ebola has claimed more than 2,200 deaths throughout West Africa since the outbreak began, and the sick sick are being using public transportation to get to hospitals, increasing the risk of transmitting the disease that kills about half its victims, the AP reported.
Doctors Without Borders said bodies are being left to rot in the streets of Sierra Leone, and Ibrahim Ben Kargbo, an adviser to the Sierra Leone president, acknowledged that it can take up to a full day to retrieve a dead body because it must first be tested for Ebola, according to the AP.
The three countries hit hardest by the outbreak are Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea, according to the AP.
The workers are also in need of more protective gear and more treatment beds for Ebola victims, the AP reported.
The World Health Organization says about 1,000 more beds in isolation centers are needed, according to the AP.
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation announced Wednesday it will donate $50 million more to fight the Ebola outbreak, to purchase supplies and to develop vaccines, therapies and better diagnostic tools, the AP reported.
Ebola is transmitted through bodily fluids and dead bodies are particularly contagious and must be buried with extreme care, according to the AP. Experts say traditional burials that wash the dead have been a significant source of Ebola transmission.
