PARIS
A French volunteer working for Medecins Sans Frontieres in Liberia has been affected by the Ebola virus, the NGO announced.
The female volunteer was put in quarantine in Liberian capital Monrovia on Tuesday when the first symptoms appeared and she will be evacuated to a specialized treatment center in France, according to Wednesday’s statement from Medecins Sans Frontieres.
She is the first French national to catch the disease during the current outbreak.
The World Health Organization has called for more medics to help combat the virus as the death toll reached 2,453, with 4,963 confirmed cases in West Africa.
The high infection rate for health workers has made it difficult to recruit the foreign medical staff needed to combat the epidemic.
Ebola first appeared in 1976 in Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo. It can be transmitted to humans from wild animals and also spreads through contact with the body fluids of an infected person.
U.S. President Barack Obama outlined plans for dealing with Ebola during a visit on Tuesday to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta.
They include sending 3,000 troops to Liberia to set up a joint force command, a staging base in Senegal and additional treatment units across West Africa.
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