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The latest Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo has killed more than 2,000 people, bringing it close to becoming the country’s deadliest outbreak of the disease.
The outbreak, which is affecting conflict-hit areas in eastern and northeastern DRC, was officially declared on May 15, although health officials believe transmission had begun weeks earlier.
It is the country’s 17th Ebola outbreak and has already been described as its largest.
Sania Nishtar, chief executive of the Gavi global vaccine alliance, said it “and could well become the largest outbreak ever”.
Figures released Tuesday by Congolese health authorities showed that 2,011 people had died among 4,381 confirmed cases, putting the case fatality rate at 45.9%.
The toll is approaching the nearly 2,300 deaths recorded during the DRC’s 2018-2020 outbreak, the country’s deadliest so far. That outbreak recorded about 3,500 cases.
The current outbreak began in northeastern Ituri province before spreading to other areas, including North Kivu, where insecurity, weak health infrastructure and limited government presence have complicated efforts to contain the virus.
“We haven’t reached the peak yet,” Health Minister Samuel Roger Kamba said in an interview shared on X by his ministry on Tuesday.
“Within the next three months, we expect to have already brought the spread under control and to start seeing it decline,” he added.
Response efforts have been slowed by armed conflict and distrust among communities, making it difficult for health workers to identify and treat infected people.
“We are only seeing 30 percent (of infected people), where 70 percent of people are dying at home. This is why this Ebola is different,” Mohamed Yakub Janabi, the World Health Organization’s regional director for Africa, told reporters in Bunia, Ituri’s provincial capital.
Jean-Jacques Muyembe, a Congolese virologist involved in the discovery of Ebola in 1976, described the response as “slow and ineffective”.
“There is an internal problem at the level of the national coordination of the response,” he said.
“Everyone wanted to show they were doing something, even though nothing had actually been organised,” he added.
WHO vaccine experts have recommended a full-scale human trial to determine whether Ervebo, the only approved Ebola vaccine, can protect against the Bundibugyo strain currently circulating in the DRC.
Ervebo is proven effective against the Zaire strain, but there is currently no vaccine specifically approved for Bundibugyo Ebola.
Early animal studies suggest Ervebo could provide some protection.
Gavi maintains a stockpile of 500,000 Ervebo doses, some of which are already in the DRC and will be used for the planned trials.
Two potential Bundibugyo vaccines are undergoing early human trials, while a third is being developed.
Ebola spreads through contact with infected bodily fluids and causes severe haemorrhagic fever.
The disease has killed more than 15,000 people across Africa over the past five decades.
