Four major NHS hospitals are on standby to deal with a UK ebola outbreak as David Cameron prepares to chair a Cobra meeting on the threat posed by the deadly virus.
The latest guidance from NHS England officials reveals that a number of hospitals with established infectious disease units have been lined up to provide "surge capacity" if the virus spreads to Britain.
Details of the contingency plans emerged as medics in Spain continued to treat a nurse who became the first person outside Africa to contract ebola - with another four people quarantined in a Madrid hospital over fears they could have been infected.
London's Royal Free Hospital - where nurse William Pooley was successfully treated after contracting the virus in Sierra Leone - is currently the UK's only specialist High Level Isolation Unit, with two containment beds.
Under plans drawn up by NHS officials, further specialist equipment would be transferred from the Royal Free to units in Sheffield, Newcastle and Liverpool in the event of a larger outbreak.
The NHS England operational update, issued in September, states: "A letter has now gone out to the Chief Executives of The Royal Liverpool and Broadgreen University Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, Newcastle upon Tyne Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust as part of a contingency plan to support national surge."
Ahead of today's meeting of the Government's COBRA contingencies committee, David Cameron spoke to the president of Sierra Leone Ernest, who said the situation in his country continues to be "very serious".
The British Army is sending more than 100 medics to the West African country to help tackle the ebola crisis within the next few weeks.
Downing Street stressed that the COBRA meeting in Whitehall was one of a regular series of meetings and had been in the PM's diary for some time.
It comes as Public Health England said there were no plans to screen travellers from West Africa and chief medical officer Professor Dame Sally Davies issued a high alert to all NHS staff to be "vigilant".
The alert urged "every clinician in England" to take a full travel history of those who presented with a fever.
Dame Sally said: "It is unlikely but not impossible that people infected in Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia could arrive in the UK while incubating the disease, and then develop symptoms after their return.
"Although the likelihood of imported cases is low, health care providers are reminded to remain vigilant for those who have visited areas affected by viral haemorrhagic fever and who develop unexplained illness."
Spain's health authorities said they had been in touch with a total of 22 people who are thought to have been in contact with the infected 40-year-old nurse, whose name has not been released.
They are also monitoring around 30 other members of the health care team that treated one of the missionaries.
EU countries have demanded an explanation from Spain's health minister as to how the nurse caught the disease, despite all the precautions taken.
The World Health Organisation's European director Zsuzsanna Jakab has warned that some further infections in Europe are "unavoidable".
More than 3,400 people have died in the latest ebola outbreak, which has swept through West African countries Liberia, Guinea, Sierra Leone and Nigeria.
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