China's Ebola help on the ground, locals train for bigger spread
Training is underway for Australian medical professionals who may have to fight an Ebola outbreak.
Hundreds of health practitioners from Australia and New Zealand have signed up for highly-specialised training in Darwin, as part of the National Critical Care and Trauma Response Centre's preparations to combat the disease.
They are learning what to do if the virus takes hold in the Asia-Pacific region.
Meanwhile, protestors dressed in quarantine protective gear used the weekend’s G20 summit to call on world leaders for more support.
They held clocks to represent the short time left to get the disease under control.
Oxfam Australia chief executive Helen Szoke has pointed out that there are less than two weeks left until the UN's 60 day window of opportunity to control the disease expires.
Ms Szoke has tried to reach the arbiters of Australia’s response, by painting the outbreak as an economic, as well as a health, crisis.
The World Bank warns that if the virus spreads much further in Africa, the economic cost could reach $32 billion.
China has leant a helping hand over the weekend though, with a large team of Chinese health workers landing in Liberia to boost the Ebola.
Around 160 Chinese health workers have landed as part of China’s vow to “extinguish” the epidemic, which has now claimed more than 5100 lives.
The team of doctors, epidemiologists and nurses will work out of a $44 million Ebola treatment unit to be built and get up and running in just 10 days.
The Chinese health workers bring previous experience in tackling SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome) in Asia.
China is Africa's largest single trading partner, and has pledged the equivalent of $US122 million to help fight the epidemic in Ebola-hit countries.