Two children sit outside a hospital in Kenema, the third largest city in Sierra Leone, digging into a bowl of food and sharing plastic bags of clean water. They have both been orphaned during the Ebola outbreak that has gripped West Africa and put the rest of the planet in a state of constant vigilance and fear. The death toll in the outbreak is now at 4,546, around half of the  known cases in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, according to the latest figures from the UN World Health Organization. Tragedy: Two young orphans whose parents have died of Ebola sharing a meal in Kenema,  Sierra Leone . Now, the WHO is scaling up efforts to reach 600,000 people that have been affected by the health crisis in the area, that has seen hundreds of children orphaned and many families left without a breadwinner. The latest death toll was released as the news came that Nigeria has been declared free from Ebola after passing the six week mark with no new cases. 'This is a spectacular success story,' Rui Gama Vaz from the WHO told a news conference in the capital Abuja, where officials broke into applause when he announced that Nigeria had shaken off the disease. 'It shows that Ebola can be contained, but we must be clear that we have only won a battle, the war will only end when West Africa is also declared free of Ebola.' This year's outbreak of the highly infectious haemorrhagic fever thought to have originated in forest bats is the worst on record. Left behind: Children from Sierra Leone, where hundreds have died from Ebola, sitting in front of the hospital . Aftermath: Sierra Leone health workers bury an Ebola victim near Kenema Hospital in Sierra Leone as  Nigeria has been declared  Ebola free after six weeks of no new cases . Victim: Ebola has claimed the lives of over 4,500 people across West Africa with Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia the worst affected . It was imported to Nigeria when Liberian-American diplomat Patrick Sawyer collapsed at the main international airport in Lagos on July 20. Airport staff were unprepared and the government had not set up any hospital isolation unit, so he was able to infect several people, including health workers in the hospital where he was taken, some of whom had to restrain him to keep him there. Lagos, the commercial hub of Africa's most populous nation, largest economy and leading energy producer, would have been an ideal springboard for Ebola to spread across the country. 'Nigeria was not really prepared for the outbreak, but the swift response from the federal government, state governments (and) international organisations was essential,' said Samuel Matoka, Ebola operations manager in Nigeria for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC). 'If a country like Nigeria, hampered by serious security problems, can do this ... any country in the world experiencing an imported case can hold onward transmission to just a handful of cases,' WHO Director Margaret Chan said in a statement. For the three impoverished countries at the epicentre of the crisis, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea, it is a different matter. According to consultancy DaMina Advisors, Nigeria has one doctor per 2,879 people compared with one per 86,275 in Liberia. Gripping a nation: Bystanders look at a health worker in protective clothing after he and his colleagues removed the body of a woman suspected of having died after contracting the Ebola virus in Liberia . Health workers carry the woman's body to a nearby burial site in Bomi county, on the outskirts of Monrovia . Yesterday, Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf said Ebola has killed more than 2,000 people in her country and has brought it to 'a standstill', noting that Liberia and two other badly hit countries were already weakened by years of war. Appealing for more international help, Sirleaf described the devastating effects of Ebola in a 'Letter to the World' that was broadcast Sunday by the BBC. 'Across West Africa, a generation of young people risk being lost to an economic catastrophe as harvests are missed, markets are shut and borders are closed,' the Nobel Peace Prize laureate said. 'The virus has been able to spread so rapidly because of the insufficient strength of the emergency, medical and military services that remain under-resourced.' 'There is no coincidence Ebola has taken hold in three fragile states - Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea - all battling to overcome the effects of interconnected wars,' she said adding that Liberia once had 3,000 medical doctors but by the end of its civil war in 2003, the country had just 36.
Hundreds of children have been orphaned when parents died from Ebola .
Death toll of outbreak is now at 4,546, and Sierra Leone is among worst hit .
WHO is now scaling up efforts to reach 600,000 affected in West Africa .
Two children sit outside a hospital in Kenema, the third largest city in Sierra Leone, digging into a bowl of food and sharing plastic bags of clean water. They have both been orphaned during the Ebola outbreak that has gripped West Africa and put the rest of the planet in a state of constant vigilance and fear. The death toll in the outbreak is now at 4,546, around half of the known cases in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, according to the latest figures from the UN World Health Organization. Tragedy: Two young orphans whose parents have died of Ebola sharing a meal in Kenema,  Sierra Leone . Now, the WHO is scaling up efforts to reach 600,000 people that have been affected by the health crisis in the area, that has seen hundreds of children orphaned and many families left without a breadwinner. The latest death toll was released as the news came that Nigeria has been declared free from Ebola after passing the six week mark with no new cases. 'This is a spectacular success story,' Rui Gama Vaz from the WHO told a news conference in the capital Abuja, where officials broke into applause when he announced that Nigeria had shaken off the disease. 'It shows that Ebola can be contained, but we must be clear that we have only won a battle, the war will only end when West Africa is also declared free of Ebola.' This year's outbreak of the highly infectious haemorrhagic fever thought to have originated in forest bats is the worst on record. Left behind: Children from Sierra Leone, where hundreds have died from Ebola, sitting in front of the hospital . Aftermath: Sierra Leone health workers bury an Ebola victim near Kenema Hospital in Sierra Leone as  Nigeria has been declared  Ebola free after six weeks of no new cases . Victim: Ebola has claimed the lives of over 4,500 people across West Africa with Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia the worst affected . It was imported to Nigeria when Liberian-American diplomat Patrick Sawyer collapsed at the main international airport in Lagos on July 20. Airport staff were unprepared and the government had not set up any hospital isolation unit, so he was able to infect several people, including health workers in the hospital where he was taken, some of whom had to restrain him to keep him there. Lagos, the commercial hub of Africa's most populous nation, largest economy and leading energy producer, would have been an ideal springboard for Ebola to spread across the country. 'Nigeria was not really prepared for the outbreak, but the swift response from the federal government, state governments (and) international organisations was essential,' said Samuel Matoka, Ebola operations manager in Nigeria for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC). 'If a country like Nigeria, hampered by serious security problems, can do this ... any country in the world experiencing an imported case can hold onward transmission to just a handful of cases,' WHO Director Margaret Chan said in a statement. For the three impoverished countries at the epicentre of the crisis, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea, it is a different matter. According to consultancy DaMina Advisors, Nigeria has one doctor per 2,879 people compared with one per 86,275 in Liberia. Gripping a nation: Bystanders look at a health worker in protective clothing after he and his colleagues removed the body of a woman suspected of having died after contracting the Ebola virus in Liberia . Health workers carry the woman's body to a nearby burial site in Bomi county, on the outskirts of Monrovia . Yesterday, Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf said Ebola has killed more than 2,000 people in her country and has brought it to 'a standstill', noting that Liberia and two other badly hit countries were already weakened by years of war. Appealing for more international help, Sirleaf described the devastating effects of Ebola in a 'Letter to the World' that was broadcast Sunday by the BBC. 'Across West Africa, a generation of young people risk being lost to an economic catastrophe as harvests are missed, markets are shut and borders are closed,' the Nobel Peace Prize laureate said. 'The virus has been able to spread so rapidly because of the insufficient strength of the emergency, medical and military services that remain under-resourced.' 'There is no coincidence Ebola has taken hold in three fragile states - Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea - all battling to overcome the effects of interconnected wars,' she said adding that Liberia once had 3,000 medical doctors but by the end of its civil war in 2003, the country had just 36.
Ebola outbreak that has gripped West Africa and outbreak is now at 4,546, around half of the in Kenema,  Sierra Leone . Now, the WHO is scaling up efforts to reach 600,000 people that have been affected by the health crisis in the died from Ebola, sitting in front of the hospital