The death toll from the worst ever outbreak of Ebola has risen to 1,145, the World Health Organization said on Friday, as 76 new deaths were reported in the two days to August 13 in the four West African nations affected by the epidemic.

The U.N. health agency said that a total of 152 confirmed, probable and suspected new cases of the deadly hemorrhagic fever were reported in the two day period in Guinea, Liberia, Nigeria and Sierra Leone, bringing the total for the outbreak to 2,127.

The death toll from the world’s worst outbreak of Ebola stood on Wednesday at 1,069 from 1,975 confirmed, probable and suspected cases. The majority were in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia, while four people have died in Nigeria.

Ebola screening at Lagos Airport. TheNation Photo

The increasing death toll confirms the fears by the head of Medecins Sans Frontieres that it  will take about six months to bring under control the Ebola epidemic,  adding that  the outbreak in West Africa felt like “wartime, is moving, advancing.”

Joanne Liu, international president of MSF (Doctors Without Borders), speaking after a 10-day trip to West Africa, said more experts were needed on the ground and was critical of the World Health Organisation (WHO) for declaring Ebola a “public health emergency of international concern” only on Aug 8.

“We need people with a hands-on operational mindset,” to combat the outbreak, Liu told a news briefing in Geneva.

Liu said she had conveyed those messages to the WHO and “that I think the wake-up call was too late in calling it a public health emergency of international concern.”

“I think we have a common understanding on it now,” Liu said. “Now we have to find out how that is translated into concrete action in the field … a statement will save lives only if followed up on the ground.”

On Thursday, the WHO said staff in West Africa had seen evidence that the numbers of reported cases and deaths vastly underestimate the scale of the Ebola outbreak and said it would coordinate “a massive scaling up of the international response”.