New U.N. Ebola Mission Will Depend on International Support

By Cheryl Pellerin
DoD News, Defense Media Activity
WASHINGTON, Sept. 19, 2014 - In an emergency session yesterday convened by the United States, 131 members of the United Nations Security Council unanimously adopted a resolution declaring the Ebola outbreak spreading now in Africa a threat to international peace and security.

A U.S. C-17 Globemaster III transport jet arrives in Liberia with the first shipment of increased U.S. military equipment and personnel for the anti-Ebola fight, Sept. 18, 2014. State Department photo (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available.

Secretary General Ban Ki-moon announced that the United Nations will deploy a new emergency health mission to combat the deadly viral disease. He sent the details of the U.N. Mission for Ebola Emergency Response, or UNMEER, in a letter to the Security Council and the U.N. General Assembly, whose 69th session opened Sept. 16 in New York.
"My colleagues and I will do everything we can to ensure the success of the new mission," he said, "but its effectiveness will depend crucially on support from the international community."
Critical needs
Ban said the estimated need was for a 20-fold increase in assistance, and that earlier in the week the United Nations outlined a set of critical needs totaling nearly $1 billion over the next six months. A key enabler, he added, is medical evacuation capacity.
"I applaud the leadership of U.S. President Barack Obama and warmly welcome his announcement that the United States will deploy 3,000 troops to provide expertise in logistics, training and engineering," the secretary general said.
In her remarks during the emergency session, World Health Organization Director-General Dr. Margaret Chan also praised U.S. and United Kingdom military contributions to the Ebola effort.
"I and my staff wholeheartedly welcome the announcements from the U.S. and U.K. governments earlier this week. This is a massive ramp-up of support that brings a transformational change in our collective capacity to get a grip on this outbreak and bring it under control," she said.
The announcement was a statement of concern at the highest level of government, Chan added, and a clarion call for other countries to follow.
"The fact that the U.S., U.K., China, Cuba and other countries are using a variety of assets, including military assets, speaks to the complexity of the challenge," the director-general said.
Lives, societies shattered
"This surge of support could help turn things around for the roughly 22 million people in the hardest-hit countries," she said, "whose lives and societies have been shattered by one of the most horrific diseases on this planet."
On Sept. 16, during a visit at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, Obama announced that at the Liberian government's request, the United States has established a military command center in the nation's capital Monrovia to support civilian efforts against the region's Ebola epidemic.
The effort, Operation United Assistance, will involve an estimated 3,000 U.S. forces and will be led, the president said, by Maj. Gen. Darryl A. Williams, commander of U.S. Army Africa, the Army component of U.S. Africa Command.
The president said the team on the ground would create an air bridge to speed health workers and medical supplies into West Africa, and establish a staging area in Senegal to more quickly get personnel and aid on the ground.
On Sept., 16, the Defense Department requested to reprogram an additional $500 million in fiscal year 2014 overseas contingency operations funds to provide urgent humanitarian assistance to fight Ebola. This is on top of a previous reprogramming request of $500 million for both Iraq and Ebola, defense officials said. As such, DoD would be prepared to devote up to $1 billion to Ebola response efforts. A portion of funding will be used to fulfill requirements identified by CDC, the U.S. Agency for International Development, the Joint Staff and Africom.
The funds will provide military air transportation for DoD and non-DoD personnel and supplies, medical treatment facilities, personnel protective equipment and medical supplies, logistics and engineering support, and subject matter experts in support of sanitation and mortuary affairs.
Defense Department efforts
Other DoD efforts underway include:
-- The command's service members will establish a site to train up to 500 health care providers per week.
-- In August, USAID deployed a Disaster Assistance Response Team, or DART, to West Africa to coordinate and prioritize the U.S. government's outbreak response. The 28-member team includes staff from USAID, DoD, CDC and the U.S. Forest Service.
-- In late August, the DART airlifted 5,000 body bags to step up support for the safe removal and transport of bodies of Ebola victims and 500 infrared thermometers to bolster Ebola screening efforts.
-- DoD's Cooperative Threat Reduction, or CTR, program is redirecting $25 million to provide personal protective equipment and laboratory reagents, support for technical advisors, and other requests as validated by the DART.
-- DoD has requested to reprogram $60 million to allow the CTR program to address urgent biosafety, biosecurity, and disease biosurveillance needs in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea, and bolster the capabilities of neighboring countries and other partners in Africa.
-- DoD plans to send a field-deployable hospital to Liberia and has provided more than 10,000 Ebola test kits to the Liberian Institute of Biological Research and to Sierra Leone's Kenema Government Hospital.
-- DoD has provided personal protective equipment and training to local medical professionals in affected regions.