Ebola outbreak death toll rises to 80 as containment efforts intensify

An Ebola outbreak in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo has triggered an urgent scramble by medical teams, after a delayed diagnosis and rapid spread raised fears among health officials.

The World Health Organization (WHO) declared the outbreak a public health emergency of international concern yesterday, warning that the risk of wider cross-border transmission had increased after two cases were confirmed in Kampala, the capital of neighbouring Uganda.

In recent weeks, the outbreak is believed to have killed about 80 people. Laboratory testing has confirmed eight cases, while 246 suspected infections have been reported in Ituri province in eastern DRC.

A further case was confirmed in Goma, the capital of neighbouring North Kivu province, according to the M23 rebels who control the city.

A health officer sanitises the hands of a man transporting goods

A team led by DRC health minister Samuel Roger Kamba reached Bunia, the capital of Ituri, yesterday carrying tents intended for treatment centres as authorities moved to ease pressure on overstretched local hospitals.

“This is not a mystical disease. Make yourself known so that you can be taken care of and so that we can prevent the disease from spreading,” he told Reuters.

Anne Ancia, the WHO’s representative in DRC, said the agency had already depleted its stockpile of protective equipment in Kinshasa and was arranging a cargo flight to deliver more supplies from a depot in Kenya.

The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control said it was sending an expert to the headquarters of its African counterpart in Ethiopia to help with operational planning, while the US CDC said it would reinforce its offices in the DRC and Uganda with additional personnel.

The US embassy in Uganda said it had temporarily suspended all visa services in the country because of the Ebola outbreak in the east African nation, effectively limiting travel.

A Reuters witness said Congolese travellers attempting to cross from Bukavu into Rwanda were turned back by border authorities.

Previous outbreak response was complicated by insecurity

The current outbreak involves the Bundibugyo virus, which, unlike the more common Zaire strain of Ebola, has no approved virus-specific therapeutics or vaccine.

A 2018-2020 outbreak of the Zaire strain in North Kivu and Ituri provinces became the second deadliest ever recorded, killing nearly 2,300 people.

That response was hampered by the entrenched armed violence in eastern Congo, a threat that remains in place today.

Jean Pierre Badombo, the former mayor of Mongbwalu, a mining town in Ituri at the centre of the outbreak, said residents began falling sick in April after a large open-casket funeral procession arrived from Bunia.

The Bundibugyo strain of Ebola has no approved specific therapeutics or vaccine

“After that, we experienced a cascade of deaths,” he said.

The WHO said it was alerted on 5 May to an unidentified illness with a high death rate in Mongbwalu, including four health workers who had died within four days, and sent in a rapid response team.

But several follow-on failures, including an initial decision by personnel in Bunia not to escalate samples for further testing after they returned negative for the Zaire strain, delayed detection of the virus until 14 May, Congolese health officials told Reuters. The outbreak was declared a day later.

Lievin Bangali, IRC’s senior health coordinator in DRC, said shrinking support from international donors had also eroded disease surveillance capacity.

“When surveillance networks break down, dangerous diseases like Ebola are able to spread further and faster before communities and health workers can respond,” he said.

Uganda postpones Martyrs’ Day holiday

Congo has recorded 17 Ebola outbreaks since the virus was first identified in the country in 1976.

The disease is transmitted through direct contact with the bodily fluids of infected people or with contaminated materials.

According to the WHO, Ebola’s average fatality rate is about 50%, though past outbreaks have ranged from 25% to 90%.

Uganda postponed next month’s Martyrs’ Day celebrations yesterday, a national holiday that عادة draws thousands of pilgrims from eastern DRC, because of the outbreak.

Kithula Haggai Sunday, a doctor at Uganda’s health ministry, told an online briefing that several people from western Uganda who had recently attended a burial in eastern Congo before returning home were being monitored. Some who developed symptoms were taken to the city of Fort Portal.