Liberia’s President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf apologized for the high death toll among the country’s healthcare workers battling the West African Ebola Outbreak, which has killed nearly 1,000 people in four countries – Liberia, Sierra Leone, Guinea, and Nigeria.

“If we haven't done enough so far, I have come to apologize to you,” President Johnson Sirleaf told a gathering of hundreds of healthcare workers at Monrovia’s City Hall.  She’s pledging US$18 Million for the fight against Ebola, part of which will be dedicated to health insurance and death benefits for the healthcare workers.  The rest will fund more ambulances and treatment centers.  Healthcare workers are especially at risk because Ebola is transmitted through bodily fluids.

Liberia’s information minister Lewis Brown admits the country was overwhelmed by the outbreak and its ill-prepared healthcare system is “overtaxed”.  But he insists authorities are doing their best against an unprecedented crisis.  Five of the biggest hospitals in the capital Monrovia had closed for more than a week.

“Some of them have now started to re-open but there are other hospitals in other counties that are just abandoned by the staff,” said Lindis Hurum, the Liberia coordinator for Medecins sans Frontieres (MSF) – known in English as Doctors Without Borders.  “Our capacity is stretched beyond anything that we ever done before in regards to Ebola response,” she added.

With healthcare systems completely overrun, people flooded churches on Sunday, seeking help from beyond medical science.

“Everyone is so afraid,” said Martee Jones Seator at Saint Peter’s Lutheran Church in Monrovia.  “Ebola is not going to shake our faith in any way, because we’ve been through difficult times.”