LIBERIA’S Ebola crisis stepped up a gear today as dozens of starving quarantined people threatened to break out of isolation.

Forty-three people were isolated after four residents of Jenewonda, near the Sierra Leone border, died from the illness.

But the countries worst affected by the Ebola epidemic are now facing drastic food shortages since many farmers and people employed in food distribution have fled the area.

The quarantined citizens said the UN’s World Food Programme (WFP) had stopped providing food to the area.

But WFP spokesman Alexis Masciarelli said the organisation had only heard about the isolated community two days ago and was now organising a mission to send them food.

He said relief workers would “keep working with government and partners to identify the communities in need as quickly as possible.”

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has launched a $179 million (£112m) emergency appeal for food aid to Ebola-hit countries and has so far raised $59m (£37m), with the biggest contributions coming from the United States, China and Japan.

WHO held a summit in Havana earlier this week where praise was heaped on Cuba for taking the lead in sending doctors and nurses to tackle the outbreak of the deadly virus, to which there is no proven cure.

WHO chief Margaret Chan said Cuba had brought “a new phase of hope to what is otherwise a horrific outbreak.”