The United Kingdom is to send 750 troops from Northern Ireland to help fight Ebola in Sierra Leone.

The British Foreign Secretary, Philip Hammond confirmed the news this evening.

The UK will also send a medical ship and three helicopters when the personnel deploy next week.

The troops will be drawn from the Royal Scots Borders 1st Battalion, based in Holywood, Co. Down. The troops will be stationed near Sierra Leone capital Freetown.

Commanding officer Lieutenant Colonel Matt Munro said of the mission: “This is a challenge unlike any, but the point is that we are very well prepared."

The news comes shortly after British Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt said it is “now entirely possible that someone with Ebola will come to the UK either by one route or another.”

Defence Secretary Michael Fallon said: "The Ebola outbreak in West Africa is already a global threat to public health and it's vital that the UK remains at the forefront of responding to the epidemic.

"We are stepping up significantly the UK's contribution and leadership in work to tackle the outbreak, on land, in the air and at sea.

"At the heart of the package is the commitment to provide more than 750 personnel to help with the establishment of Ebola treatment centres and an Ebola training academy."

Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond told Sky News: "We have really a matter of weeks to get on top of this, to get ahead of the curve of disease replication, by putting new and appropriate assets into Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea so that we can contain it and get on top of the outbreak.

"The challenge is there is a need to move at speed, and it is not just about money, it's about providing the necessary qualified personnel to staff the beds that we're building, for example, in Sierra Leone."

The current death toll in West Africa is 3,879 recorded deaths from the virus. A total of over 8,000 people have been infected.

The deaths have been largely spread between three countries – Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.