Grim milestone: 10,000 dead in Ebola outbreak, most in West Africa

Source: Associated Press

The World Health Organization marked a grim milestone Thursday in the biggest-ever Ebola outbreak, estimating that the virus had killed more than 10,000 people, mostly in the West African nations of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.

Fifteen other Ebola deaths have also occurred in Mali, Nigeria and the United States.

When Ebola was first detected in March 2014 in Guinea's forest, officials assumed the deadly virus could quickly be stamped out, just as it had in more than two dozen previous outbreaks, mostly in central and eastern Africa. But health officials now acknowledge they were too slow to respond to this emergency, allowing Ebola to cross porous borders in a region where broken health systems were unable to stop its spread.

A huge global response -- including soldiers sent by Britain, the U.S. and other nations -- has slowed the deaths from Ebola dramatically, especially Liberia, but the virus appears stubbornly entrenched in parts of Guinea and Sierra Leone.

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