Girls look at a poster, distributed by Unicef, bearing information on and illustrations of best practices that help prevent the spread of Ebola virus disease (EVD), in the city of Voinjama, in Lofa County, Liberia. Photos: Reuters

Hundreds of troops were deployed in Sierra Leone and Liberia yesterday to fight the worst outbreak of the deadly Ebola virus, as the death toll climbed to 887 and three new suspected cases of the highly contagious disease were reported in Nigeria.

With healthcare systems in the West Africa nations completely overrun by the epidemic, the African Development Bank said on Monday it would immediately disburse $50 million to Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea – the countries worst affected – as part of an international effort to contain it.

The World Health Organisation, which warned last week of catastrophic consequences if the disease were not controlled, reported 61 new deaths in the two days to August 1. The outbreak began in February in the forests of Guinea, where the toll continues to rise, but its epicentre has since shifted to neighbouring Liberia and Sierra Leone.

The situation will probably get worse before it gets better

In Nigeria, where US citizen Patrick Sawyer died of Ebola in late July after arriving from Liberia, the WHO reported three new cases, two of them probable and one suspected. Nigerian authorities had said earlier yesterday that a doctor who treated Sawyer had contracted the disease, but a health ministry official declined to comment on the discrepancy.

Panic among local communities, which have attacked health workers and threatened to burn down isolation wards, prompted Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea to impose tough measures last week, including the closure of schools and the quarantine of the remote forest region hardest hit by the disease.

Long convoys of military trucks ferried troops and medical workers yesterday to Sierra Leone’s far east, where the density of cases is highest.

Military spokesman Colonel Michael Samoura said the operation, code-named Octopus, involved around 750 military personnel. Troops will gather in the southeastern town of Bo before travelling to isolated communities to implement quarantines, he added.

Healthcare workers will be allowed to come and go freely, and the communities will be kept supplied with food.

In neighbouring Liberia, President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf and ministers held a crisis meeting on Sunday to discuss a series of anti-Ebola measures as police contained infected communities in the northern Lofa county.

Police were setting up checkpoints and roadblocks for key entrance and exit points to those infected communities, with nobody allowed to leave quarantined communities. Troops were fanning out across Liberia to help deal with the emergency.

“The situation will probably get worse before it gets better,” Liberian Information Minister Lewis Brown told Reuters. “We are over-stretched. We needsupport; we need resources; we need workers.”

WHO chief Margaret Chan warned regional leaders that Ebola was outpacing their efforts to contain it and pledged to organise a $100 million international response to bring the outbreak under control.