The Ebola epidemic is at risk of becoming a tragedy of truly global proportions. But the international response is verging on becoming its own kind of tragedy too.
The scale of the outbreak is in part a product of decades of underfunded and badly managed local healthcare systems, stifled by persistent poverty, war, corruption and political instability.
Today in many West African nations, entire families, sometimes entire communities, have been decimated by Ebola not because of the veracity of the virus, but because of a lack of effective healthcare which means infection rates are high and recovery chances are low.
In Liberia, one of the West African countries worst affected, there are not enough trained healthcare workers to manage the outbreak: In 2008 Liberia had 1.4 doctors and 27 nurses per 100,000, compared with 242 and 981 respectively in the US. Local health centres, the front line in combating the spread of the disease rely on committed and determined healthcare workers but often lack gloves, aprons or chlorine to help them handle suspected Ebola cases.
In this context, health professionals, aid organisations and humanitarian workers have taken huge personal risk in the service of others to try and help support the local efforts to counter the epidemic. Their contribution and bravery has been truly humbling.
Yet while this is a crisis concentrated in West Africa, the solution to this crisis cannot be delivered by local health services, governments or aid workers alone. These efforts, however commendable, will never alone be sufficient to meet the scale of this challenge.
The mobilisation of the African Union, including its decision to establish a humanitarian corridor from Dakar, was vital in helping promote much needed regional coordination on the ground.
And contributions by individual countries, including the UK government - which has already committed over £200m, 750 troops, 700 beds and plans to train 800 local health professionals - are much needed and very welcome.
But in truth, the scale of the challenge can only be met a truly coordinated international response. As John Kerry has said, what we now need is a global plan to deal with a global crisis.
In September the UN Security Council passed Resolution 2177 designating the Ebola outbreak as a threat to international peace and security.
That is why it is so concerning that serious questions are already being asked about the scale and nature of the international response.
Earlier this month, a leaked World Health Organisation report suggested that within the WHO itself, people already admit that serious failures were made from the start that may have directly cost lives and undoubtedly prolonged the epidemic.
For the sake of our ability to deal with future threats, an independent investigation into the outbreak and the response to it - under UN auspices - should be undertaken. That investigation should analyse all aspects of the response, from the office of the director-general of the WHO to the locally based health workers and including in-country NGOs as well as privately run airlines and security companies.
Clearly the most urgent priority for change in the international community's approach must come down to the cash commitments countries are willing to make.
Whether through underestimating the scale of demand, or through a lack of political will, there is today an unjustifiable shortfall in the UN Ebola appeal.
The UN requested $100 million a month ago and now it has increased its appeal to $1 billion. That's a ten-fold in a month. And yet only $117 million has actually been pledged, leaving a funding shortfall of nearly $900 million.
This short-fall is testament to the failure of the international community to grasp not just the scale of the challenge we face, but also the nature of the responsibilities we have.
It is simply wrong to rely on the bravery and commitment of thousands of health and aid workers when the international community won't raise the millions needed to help fund and expand their work.
So this shortfall must be addressed and countries that have not contributed sufficiently must be pressured to do more.
Increased funding, though vital, alone will not be enough to address or prevent such an epidemic from taking hold again.
The decision to establish the first-ever UN emergency health mission (UNMEER), and the appointment of David Nabarro as Special Envoy on Ebola, are welcome steps forward in coordinating a more effective international response.
International crisis appeals cannot overcome the fact that it is simply not possible to train up the number of local health workers needed in such a short space of time. So part of this response must feed into a long term strategy for tackling the drivers of this outbreak that clearly go beyond simply the veracity of the virus.
This can only be addressed through long term preventative strategies that focus on building up local capacity not just when a crisis has already broken, but before it has been able to take hold.
Today there is an impending sense of panic as countries, organisations and NGOs collectively to try and contain the damage to social order and human dignity that this outbreak is inflicting on West Africa.
It remains to be seen whether scaled-up responses can control the epidemic. But, there awaits another challenge - of identifying what went wrong, where mistakes were made, why we ended up in crisis and how to ensure a similar one does not happen again.
Now is not a time for excuses, now is a time for action. The very fact we are in the midst of a crisis on this scale is proof that the international community has not yet done enough.
This epidemic can, and must, be overcome. But the question now is how many more will have to die before it is, how many of those tragic deaths could have been avoided.