WASHINGTON — President Obama is asking Congress for $6.2 billion in emergency funds to fight Ebola. The request covers spending to confront the disease at its source in West Africa and to secure the United States against any possible spread.

Administration officials say the money would be apportioned into nearly $2 billion for the United States Agency for International Development and $2.4 billion to the Department of Health and Human Services. More than $1.5 billion would be for a contingency fund.

Developments

Recovered patient mourns euthanized dog

MADRID — A Spanish nursing assistant who recovered from Ebola credited health care workers with saving her life and offered Wednesday to donate blood to help cure others.

Still, Teresa Romero slammed Spanish officials for killing her beloved dog, saying the mixed breed named Excalibur was unnecessarily “executed.”

The 44-year-old Romero issued a statement as she was released from Madrid’s Carlos III hospital after spending 30 days there, most of it in quarantine.

Her husband, Javier Limon, read Romero’s remarks about Excalibur as she listened at his side, saying his wife was too emotional to talk about the dog that was like the childless couple’s own child.

Madrid health officials euthanized Excalibur on Oct. 8, saying the dog posed a potential public health risk for Ebola transmission. But the dog of a nurse who got Ebola in Dallas was simply quarantined and then later reunited with its owner.

Killing Excalibur “wasn’t necessary,” Romero said in her statement. “The worst part of all of this is that our dog was not given a chance.”

Plan unveiled to test multiple drugs

NEW ORLEANS — The quest for an Ebola treatment is picking up speed. Federal officials have unveiled a plan to test multiple drugs at once, in an umbrella study with a single comparison group to give fast answers on what works.

“This is novel for us” and is an approach pioneered by cancer researchers, said Dr. Luciana Borio, head of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s Ebola response. “We need to learn what helps and what hurts” and speed treatments to patients, she said.

She outlined the plan at an American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene conference in New Orleans.

Botswana doctor to lead Africa effort

COTONOU, Benin — The World Health Organization elected a new director of its Africa office, which has been accused of bungling the early response to the outbreak.

The new chief, Matshidiso Moeti, is a doctor from Botswana and a WHO veteran who stepped down as deputy director for Africa in March, the same month the crisis was announced.

– From news service reports

The Ebola money is the first request from Obama in the aftermath of an election that ushered in a Republican-controlled Congress and that’s being widely perceived as a repudiation of the president. The White House is asking for prompt action, meaning it wants approval during the current lame duck session.

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