World Health Organization to announce decision on Ebola outbreak

On a separate occasion, President Obama talked about the experimental drug that was recently used on two Americans... to treat Ebola infection. Experts around the world are still discussing whether the outbreak in West Africa... constitutes a public health emergency of international concern. Shin Se-min has the details. After two days of emergency talks on the Ebola outbreak in West Africa, the World Health Organization will announce Friday whether it considers the matter a public health emergency worthy of international concern. If it deems that it is, the UN health agency will urge appropriate measures to curb the spread of the virus, which has thus far been largely contained to three West African countries. But concerns ARE spreading. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued its highest alert level this week in response to the outbreak. Amid growing international pressure to consider the use of experimental drugs in combating the virus, the U.S. government is forming a special Ebola working body that will explore its options. The calls have grown louder since two American missionary workers infected with the disease while in West Africa began recovering... after taking an experimental serum called ZMapp. U.S. President Barack Obama has so far been hesitant to allow such untested medicines to be released for mass use. "I think we've got to let the science guide us,... and I don't think all the information is in on whether this drug is helpful." The WHO says the more than 17-hundred people have been infected in the current Ebola outbreak and that at least 932 people have been killed. Shin Se-min, Arirang News.