UN to feed one million in Ebola-hit countries

UN to feed one million in Ebola-hit countries

The United Nations is to fly in food aid for up to a million people affected by the Ebola outbreak in West Africa.

According to the World Food Programme, an arm of the UN, the agency is bringing in its own aircraft to make sure food gets through to quarantined areas in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.

The organisation said it would come to the aid of these worst Ebola-hit countries due to the problem of food crisis there.

The WFP Spokesperson, Fabienne Pompey, said, “The restrictions on movement in the most affected areas threatens food security. Commerce is affected; people cannot get to their fields; and prices rise at the markets; so the poorest have trouble feeding themselves.”

As a result of the Ebola outbreak, the WFP said it had already started feeding several thousand people in the worst affected areas, including the families of victims who have been quarantined, orphans, old people and hunters hit by the ban on the sale of bush meat.

With several commercial carriers suspending flights to the region because of the epidemic, she said the agency would start a new humanitarian service on Saturday (today) with an aircraft based in Conakry, Guinea which would link the capitals of the three countries.

She said two helicopters would also be brought in to deliver aid to the most isolated areas.