Dutch medics ready for ebola deployment

Doctors Without Borders (MSF) announced on Thursday that thirteen Dutch doctors and nurses are ready to travel to West Africa to fight Ebola.

Health Minister Edith Schippers and the Dutch branch of MSF asked aid workers to go to the affected countries of Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea. More than two hundred people volunteered, but only a few had the necessary skills and experience.

"We set high standards. The aid workers must have experience with the protective suits that they have to wear and with tropical and infectious diseases" a MSF spokesperson explains. The organization is "not greatly disappointed" with the number of people that made it to the next step in the screening. "Not just anyone can go there. We have far from enough people, but we welcome any new aid worker."

An imitation Ebola field hospital is being set up in a warehouse in Amsterdam in order to prepare aid workers for deployment to West Africa. The hospital imitates the situation in the areas where Ebola prevails, so there is no light or running water.

Though commitments have been made and materials and people are being sent to Ebola affected countries, there hasn't been much progress. The Ebola epidemic in West Africa has killed more than 3,800 people according to figures from the World Health Organization (WHO). According to MSF there are still critical deficiencies in the fight against Ebola.