Writing in the state media Saturday, the 88-year-old Castro said the cooperation would be in the interest of "peace in the world," and is not an attempt to resolve issues between the U.S. and Cuba.
"We will gladly cooperate with American personnel in that task and not in search for peace between the two states that have been adversaries for so many years, but in any case, for peace in the world, a goal that can and should be attempted," a Cuban television broadcaster read Castro's remarks on the air.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry praised Cuba's efforts Friday for its impressive response to the Ebola crisis, saying "Cuba - a country of just 11 million people - has sent 165 health professionals and it plans to send nearly 300 more" to hard-hit West Africa.
Cuba has a history of sending its doctors to emergencies around the world.
"It took our country not one minute to respond to the international agencies before requesting support against the brutal epidemic that has broken out in West Africa. It's what our country has always done without excluding anyone," Castro said in his remarks.
Jorge Perez, director of the tropical disease hospital where Cuban doctors train for the Ebola mission, said he believed the U.S. and Cuban missions to fight Ebola could lead to improved diplomatic relations.
Cuba has sent medical brigades to disaster sites around the world since the 1959 revolution that brought Fidel Castro to power.
Besides medical diplomacy, Cuba sends doctors overseas in exchange for money or goods, notably Venezuelan oil, making professional services a top export earner.
A
burial team in protective gear carry the body of a woman suspected to
have died from Ebola virus in Monrovia, Liberia. Oct, 18, 2014.Meanwhile, the international aid agency Oxfam is appealing to European Union foreign ministers to do more to fight Ebola; a disease Oxfam says could be the "definitive humanitarian disaster of our generation."
The chief of the British charity, Mark Goldring, has called for more troops, funding and medical staff to be sent to Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia - the countries hit hardest by the epidemic. Goldring said countries that fail to make a commitment to fight Ebola "are in danger of costing lives."
The World Health Organization says more than 4,500 people have died from Ebola in West Africa. Health experts predict thousands more deaths before the end of the year.
The WHO said it would conduct a "full review" of the global Ebola response after the outbreak is under control.
However, the WHO said it would not comment on an internal report obtained by the Associated Press saying the agency missed opportunities to prevent Ebola from spreading in West Africa.
According to the AP, the WHO blamed its staff for a slow response to the Ebola outbreak. It said its personnel failed to grasp that traditional infectious disease containment methods do not work in a region with porous borders and broken health infrastructures.
The leaked report said "nearly everyone involved in the outbreak response failed to see some fairly plain writing on the wall."
U.S. President Barack Obama met with members of his national security and public health teams Saturday evening to update him on the response to the domestic Ebola cases.
Two nurses who treated an Ebola patient in Dallas, Texas, have been hospitalized with the disease. Investigators are looking into how they became sick.
Obama is calling on Americans not to give in to Ebola "hysteria or fear."
In his weekly Saturday address, Obama urged people to keep the situation in perspective. He said the U.S. may see more isolated cases, but said he was "absolutely confident" officials can prevent a serious outbreak.
Canada says it will send 800 vials of an experimental Ebola vaccine to the World Health Organization in Geneva starting Monday - and the U.N. World Food Program airdropped emergency rations to more than 260,000 people in the Waterloo district of Freetown, the capital of Sierra Leone.
Some information for this report was provided by AP and Reuters.
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