DHAKA: The World Bank has announced that it is allocating $200m in emergency assistance for West African countries battling to contain the Ebola outbreak.

The money will be distributed to the governments of Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea as well as to the World Health Organization.

The number of people killed in the outbreak has reached 887, the WHO says.

The World Bank’s announcement came as African leaders including 35 presidents discuss the crisis in Washington.

World Bank President Jim Yong Kim, an expert on infectious diseases, said that he was ‘deeply saddened’ by the spread of the virus and how it was contributing to the breakdown of ‘already weak health systems in the three countries’.

‘I am very worried that many more lives are at risk unless we can stop this Ebola epidemic in its tracks,’ he said, reports the BBC.

BDST: 1430 HRS, AUG 05, 2014