WHO says Congo’s Ebola outbreak started months before it was declared
Sequencing and research suggest the virus was already active by January, and officials say more than 4,000 cases have been confirmed.
- Confirmed Ebola cases in the Democratic Republic of Congo reached 4,053, with the official death toll standing at 1,850, according to the latest government figures.
- World Health Organization regional director for Africa Mohamed Yakub Janabi reported the outbreak began in February, months before the May 15 official declaration, with early cases wrongly attributed to malaria and typhoid.
- Authorities confirmed the virus has spread across five provinces—Ituri, North Kivu, South Kivu, Haut-Uele, and Tshopo—making it the fastest-spreading Ebola outbreak on record.
- "So we are chasing the virus, the virus is ahead of us," Janabi said, highlighting critical funding and staffing shortages that have overwhelmed surveillance efforts.
- The current crisis ranks as the second-largest Ebola epidemic on record, surpassed only by the 2014-2016 West African outbreak, which infected more than 28,000 people.
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The World Health Organization (WHO) warned on Wednesday (12) of the rapid spread of the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), with an increasing number of deaths occurring outside the treatment units and without prior registration in the screening lists. The scenario points to the existence of still unknown transmission chains and led the official UN site to define the situation as a "out of control" transmission. Althoug…
The WHO is sounding the alarm: in Congo, Ebola is spreading as fast as ever before. Why the fight against the disease is so difficult.
Ebola spread undetected for months, WHO says
The Ebola outbreak that has killed more than 2,000 people began three months before it was officially declared in mid-May, the World Health Organization said, raising the likelihood that its true scale is far larger than previously thought. The outbreak, centered in eastern DR Congo, is caused by the rare Bundibugyo species of the virus and marks the second-deadliest outbreak on record.WHO Africa director Mohamed Janabi said genomic sequencing s…
The Independent (US)
Western Morning NewsEbola deaths surge past 2,000 – as outbreak spread for months undetected
The fastest growing Ebola outbreak in history – and the second deadliest – began in February, months before it was declared, the World Health Organisation has said
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