American Ebola patient to be treated near US capital

An American healthcare worker who has tested positive for Ebola will be treated at a government hospital near the US capital, Washington, officials said Thursday.

The person, whose identity was not revealed, is expected to be admitted on Friday to the National Institutes of Health Clinical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, said a statement from the NIH.

"The individual was volunteering services in an Ebola treatment unit in Sierra Leone and will be transported back to the United States in isolation via a chartered aircraft," said the statement.

"No additional details about the patient are being shared at this time."

The same facility treated US nurse Nina Pham, who was infected while caring for a Liberian man at a Texas hospital.

The man, Thomas Eric Duncan, died. Pham and another nurse who was also infected recovered.

Earlier Thursday, the World Health Organization announced that the death toll from the world's largest Ebola outbreak had topped 10,000.

Most of the deaths in the outbreak, which began in late 2013, have been in the West African nations of Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia.

© 2015 AFP

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