Obama to allies: ‘Robust’ effort needed on Ebola

President Obama “stressed the need for a faster and more robust international response to the Ebola epidemic” in a videoconference Wednesday with the leaders of France, Germany, Italy and the United Kingdom.

{mosads}The rare videoconference with top European allies came just hours after a second U.S. nurse was diagnosed with Ebola, and a few days after the World Health Organization said nearly 4,500 people have died from the virus.

“The leaders agreed to work together to enlist greater support from more countries and to coordinate their efforts on the ground,” the White House said. “President Obama made clear that the world must marshal the finances as well as the international personnel required to bend the curve of the epidemic, noting that it constitutes a human tragedy as well as a threat to international security.”

Earlier Wednesday, press secretary Josh Earnest sidestepped questions about what specific requests Obama had made of the leaders.

“As a general matter, I can tell you that the president did urge those world leaders to commit — to make a more significant commitment to dealing with the Ebola outbreak in West Africa,” Earnest said.

But the administration has repeatedly chastised the international community for not doing more — a message Obama himself carried to a meeting with 21 international military leaders on Tuesday.

“As I’ve said before, and I’m going to keep on repeating until we start seeing more progress, the world as a whole is not doing enough,” Obama said. “There are a number of countries that have capacity that have not yet stepped up.”

On Tuesday, the European Union urged member governments to quickly coordinate a response to limit the spread of the virus, which has left nearly 4,500 West Africans dead.

“If we are to contemplate such measures, they will only be truly effective if applied by concerned member states in a coordinated manner,” EU health commissioner Tonio Borg said in a letter to health ministers obtained by The New York Times.

Earnest did say the administration had been “heartened” by additional supplies offered by nongovernmental organizations around the world.

But, Earnest said, “the stakes are high, and the impact on the local population there is tragic, and we need to see a more significant commitment of resources from countries around the world to dealing with this effort.”