iStock/Thinkstock(NEW YORK) — As New York City hosts the nation’s sole Ebola patient, city and state officials have announced a program to encourage health care professionals to travel to West Africa to treat Ebola patients.

The initiative would be modeled on benefits and rights provided to military reservists.

New York state and the city will work to ensure that health care workers who travel to West Africa would have their pay, health care and employment statuses continue seamlessly when they get back.

“The depth of the challenge we face in containing Ebola requires us to meet this test in a comprehensive manner on multiple fronts, and part of that is encouraging and incentivizing medical personnel to go to West Africa,” New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said in a statement Friday.

State officials would also provide necessary reimbursements to health care workers and their employers for any quarantine that are needed upon their return to New York.

New York state is coordinating the program with New Jersey and the Greater New York Hospital Association.

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