Kenya court suspends planned U.S. quarantine facility amid Ebola outbreak

Wycliffe Muia and Akisa Wandera, NairobiSaturday May 30, 2026

With the Ebola outbreak raging in the Democratic Republic of Congo and cases now appearing in Uganda, a Kenyan court has stepped in to halt a US-backed quarantine plan that had stirred alarm over whether the country could become a staging ground for the virus.

The court has suspended American plans to establish an Ebola isolation facility for US citizens in Kenya, a proposal that had already triggered widespread concern about the risk of cross-border transmission.

The 50-bed centre was due to open on Friday and would be staffed by US medics, according to an American official. Kenya’s government has yet to address the plan publicly.

In a petition filed before the court, the rights organisation Katiba Institute argued that the arrangement carried “grave and imminent risks” to public health.

A High Court judge then ordered that no foreign government may operate any Ebola facility in Kenya until the case is heard.

US authorities did not disclose where the treatment centre would be located, but lawmakers in Laikipia county, in central Kenya, raised the alarm after reports suggested the facility would be set up there.

The MPs urged the government to spell out what was happening, saying they saw “no logic” in Kenya — or Laikipia in particular — hosting such a centre.

County Governor Joshua Irungu has also rejected the idea.

Satellite images of an air base in Laikipia appear to show an area a little larger than three football pitches cleared between Monday and Friday. Officials have not said why earthworks were carried out there.

According to US officials, the centre is meant to treat American citizens who may have been exposed to Ebola in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda.

The outbreak, concentrated in eastern DR Congo, is believed by Congolese authorities to have killed at least 220 people and infected more than 900 others. Uganda has also reported nine cases and one death.

There was one encouraging development on Friday, when the World Health Organization said an Ebola patient in DR Congo had recovered.

“This is the first one” to be discharged from a care centre “following two negative tests”, Anais Legand, a WHO technical officer on viral haemorrhagic fevers, was quoted by AFP as saying.

Discussing the Kenya deployment, a US official said: “the first group has deployed. These individuals received extensive training in the use of PPE [personal protective equipment], in the use of proper quarantine techniques”.

“We’re going to be ready to take care of our citizens as needed,” the official added.

Kenya was chosen because of “its proximity [to the location of the outbreak] and to ensure Americans can be treated in a timely matter”, the official said.

In Nairobi, however, the High Court ruling specifically prohibited government agencies and officials from “establishing, operationalising, facilitating, approving or permitting” any Ebola-related quarantine, isolation or treatment centre linked to the US or any other foreign government in Kenya.

Justice Patricia Nyaundi also stopped authorities from admitting into Kenya anyone exposed to or infected with Ebola under the proposed arrangement.

Katiba Institute had argued that proceeding without adequate safeguards would create an immediate threat to life.

The court said the public interest justified interim orders while the dispute is examined.

The ruling lands at a moment of heightened anxiety, after reports that the US could send Ebola-exposed people to Kenya for monitoring or treatment prompted sharp criticism.

Those reports have spread unease online, with many Kenyans asking whether the country has the containment capacity to manage such cases safely.

Kenya’s biggest doctors’ union has accused the government of holding “backdoor negotiations” and demanded that any bilateral agreements behind the plan be made public immediately.

The Kenya Medical Practitioners, Pharmacists and Dentists Union (KMPDU) questioned why Kenya was allegedly picked to host a quarantine facility for exposed US citizens when the country is not at the centre of the outbreak.

Kenya, the largest economy in East Africa, had not recorded any Ebola cases by Friday.

The union said it was “utterly disgusted” by what it described as a willingness to trade away Kenya’s national biosecurity in return for foreign aid.

“If it is too dangerous for America, it is too dangerous for Kenya,” the union said, accusing Washington of refusing to allow Ebola cases onto US soil.

Davji Bhimji Atellah, the union’s secretary general, said KMPDU “will not sit back and watch Kenya be treated as a containment colony for a lethal pathogen that we did not generate.”

The group also objected to suggestions that the centre might be run by US officials rather than Kenyan health workers.

“We will not tolerate an apartheid healthcare model on Kenyan soil,” KMPDU warned.

The union gave the government 48 hours to reveal the terms of the talks or face nationwide industrial action.

“Kenya is a sovereign republic, not a geopolitical isolation ward,” it said.

In a separate statement after meeting foreign diplomats in Nairobi on Thursday, President William Ruto said: “We agreed on the importance of cooperation and avoiding isolationism, recognising that public health threats do not respect borders and require coordinated regional and global action.

“Kenya will continue to act transparently, responsibly, and decisively to protect lives while contributing to regional and global health security,” Ruto added.

He did not directly mention the US plan to set up the Ebola treatment centre.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio also spoke by telephone with Ruto on Thursday, Rubio’s spokesperson said, adding that Washington plans to provide $13.5m (£10.7 m) in aid for Kenya’s Ebola preparedness efforts.

That funding forms part of a broader $112m US commitment to the regional response to the outbreak.

Additional reporting by Natasha Booty