Facebook founder, Mark Zuckerberg has pledged the sum of 25 million dollars to be given to the Centers for Disease Control Foundation, the charitable organisation that raises and distributes funds on behalf the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to public health organisations.
Making the pledge in his facebook post, the billionaire social media icon said:“Priscilla and I are donating $25 million to the Centers for Disease Control Foundation to help fight Ebola. The Ebola epidemic is at a critical turning point. It has infected 8,400 people so far, but it is spreading very quickly and projections suggest it could infect 1 million people or more over the next several months if not addressed.
“We need to get Ebola under control in the near term so that it doesn’t spread further and become a long term global health crisis that we end up fighting for decades at large scale, like HIV or polio. We believe our grant is the quickest way to empower the CDC and the experts in this field to prevent this outcome. Grants like this directly help the frontline responders in their heroic work. These people are on the ground setting up care centers, training local staff, identifying Ebola cases and much more. We are hopeful this will help save lives and get this outbreak under control.”
The World Health Organization has called for international collaboration in the fight against the epidemic which it said  may claim more lives before the end of the year if much commitment was not given to tackling the disease.
The United Nations has called for donations to meet the $1 billion it said was needed to tackle the disease.