WHO chief says suspected Ebola deaths at 220 and ‘epidemic is outpacing us’

GENEVA – Ebola may have killed more than 200 people so far in the Democratic Republic of Congo, where violence, mistrust and overwhelmed surveillance systems are straining efforts to contain the virus in the country’s conflict-hit east.

More than 900 suspected cases have been reported across 11 health zones spanning three eastern provinces, according to Health Ministry data released late on May 24.

The director-general of the World Health Organization (WHO) said on May 25 that there has been 220 suspected deaths in the current Ebola outbreak, and that a delay in detecting cases meant responders were now “playing catch-up”.

“We are urgently scaling up operations, but at the moment the epidemic is outpacing us,” Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said, adding that countries bordering the DRC – the epicentre of the outbreak – should take immediate action.

The outbreak is exposing the difficulties of mounting an Ebola response in one of the world’s most unstable regions, where armed groups control territory, health systems are fragile, and attacks on treatment centres have disrupted containment efforts.

Health workers were able to follow up with only about 20 per cent of identified contacts in a single day, according to ministry data.

“The violence is forcing people to flee, including health and humanitarian workers,” Dr Tedros said. “This is severely impeding efforts to scale up Ebola contact tracing and identify infections early enough to provide supportive care.”

The WHO has declared the outbreak of the rare Bundibugyo strain of Ebola a public health emergency of international concern.

Dr Tedros said he would travel to the DRC on May 26.

Angry residents stormed a hospital treating Ebola patients in the town of Mongbwalu late on May 24 after the authorities refused to release bodies for burial because of infection risks, the Associated Press reported.

Earlier unrest in Ituri – the province along the Ugandan border where the outbreak was first detected and most cases are concentrated – led to Ebola treatment tents being set on fire and patients fleeing a treatment centre, according to reports from the area.

Myths and misinformation about Ebola abound, and as many as one in three people in Ituri believe the virus is not real, according to ActionAid, a charity group that started conducting information sessions to address these perceptions.

Fighting myths

“We are not just fighting a deadly virus, we are fighting myths, fear and deep-seated suspicion,” Dr Saani Yakubu, director of ActionAid DRC, said in a statement.

Regional health ministers meeting in the Ugandan capital Kampala on March 23 warned that porous borders, active mining corridors and large population movements were also increasing the risk of cross-border Ebola transmission.

Ten African countries are now considered at risk from the outbreak because of regional mobility and gaps in surveillance and diagnostic capacity, Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention director-general Jean Kaseya said on May 24.

The crisis is being driven by the rare Bundibugyo strain of Ebola, for which there are no approved vaccines or antibody treatments.

Uganda has also reported five confirmed cases linked to the outbreak.

An American infected while caring for Ebola patients in the DRC had been evacuated to Germany for treatment, while high-risk contacts were moved to Germany and the Czech Republic, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said.

BLOOMBERG, REUTERS