President Obama detailed a new White House push Tuesday to combat the rapidly spreading Ebola virus, responding to growing pressure to devote more U.S. resources to the growing national security threat.
“People are literally dying in the streets,” Obama said from Atlanta’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “In West Africa, Ebola is now an epidemic of the likes we have not seen before. It is spiraling out of control. It is getting worse. It is spreading faster and exponentially.
“The world is looking to us,” the president added, imploring both an American and international audience to “do more” to fight the virus.
The president announced a plan to send up to 3,000 military personnel to West Africa, part of an effort to spend roughly $750 million to limit the spread of Ebola.
Obama said the U.S. would also set up a military command center in Liberia similar to the facility established following the 2010 Haiti earthquake.
Critics, however, have questioned whether the president waited too long to take such actions, noting that roughly 2,500 people have already died from the virus.
Still, the president insisted Tuesday that Americans need not fear an Ebola epidemic on U.S. soil.
“The chances of an Ebola outbreak here in the United States are extremely low,” he said.
But “this is a daunting task,” he added. “We can’t dawdle on this one, we have to act with force.”
