U.S. TROOPS Going To West Africa to FIGHT EBOLA

Thousands of U.S. troops may be living in tent cities in Liberia and supporting the fight against Ebola for "about a year" or until the deadly outbreak appears to be under control, the top military commander in Africa said Tuesday.

"This is not a small effort and it's not a short period of time," Army Gen. David Rodriguez, the chief of U.S. Africa Command, told reporters at the Pentagon.

About 350 U.S. troops are now in West Africa and total deployments may reach 4,000 during the next several weeks. The size and scope of the mission has expanded from initial estimates in September, when officials said it would last about six months and require about 3,000 troops.

Pentagon officials emphasize that troops will not provide medical care or have direct contact with Ebola patients. The military mission is to support civilian health care efforts through construction of new facilities, providing logistics support and training locals in prevention methods.

Rodriguez said protocols for ensuring U.S. personnel do not contract the potentially deadly disease will include wearing gloves and masks but not complete full-body protective suits. They will wash their hands and feet multiple times a day. The FDA on Monday granted an emergency use application for an experimental treatment, brincidofovir, produced by North Carolina-based Chimerix, for use in patients with Ebola. The drug is being given reportedly to Thomas Eric Duncan, the Liberian man now fighting Ebola at a Dallas medical center.

Around 200 airport workers responsible for cleaning aircraft walked off the job today. The workers say airports are not keeping them safe from the possibility of infection. The commander of the U.S. Southern Command, Marine Corps Gen. John F. Kelly, told an audience at the National Defense University illegal immigrants may bring Ebola to the United States. The president of the World Bank, Jim Kim, admitted on Wednesday that the international community had “failed miserably” in its response to the Ebola virus that has killed more than 3,800 people in west Africa and warned that the crisis now affecting Spain and the US was going to get much worse.

The first person diagnosed with Ebola in the United States died on Wednesday, underscoring questions about the quality of care he received, and the government ordered five airports to start screening passengers from West Africa for fever.

Liberian national Thomas Eric Duncan died in an isolation ward of a Dallas hospital, 11 days after being admitted on Sept. 28.

The case has stirred attention and concern that someone with Ebola had been able to fly into the United States from Liberia, raising the specter more passengers could arrive and spread the disease outside of West Africa, where nearly 4,000 people have died in three impoverished countries.