BUNIA – The number of confirmed infections in eastern Congo’s Ebola outbreak has climbed to 1,003, with 254 deaths recorded, officials said in a statement late Sunday, while efforts to track people exposed to patients continue to pose a serious obstacle.
Congo’s Ministry of Health said 100 people have recovered since the outbreak, centered in Ituri province, was declared on May 15. The ministry added that at least 365 patients are currently hospitalized or being kept in isolation.
The outbreak, driven by the rare Bundibugyo strain of the Ebola virus, has no approved vaccine or treatment and became the deadliest ever recorded in its first month. Authorities acknowledge that many infections may still be undetected and warn the outbreak has likely not yet reached its peak.
For local health teams, contact tracing remains one of the biggest challenges, with coverage standing at only 55%, according to the ministry.
Authorities have also not yet identified the outbreak’s first known patient and, as of last week, still needed to trace more than 35,000 people believed to have had contact with infected individuals.
The response has been further complicated by persistent rebel violence in eastern Congo. In Ituri, attacks by the Allied Democratic Force, a militia backed by the Islamic State group, have blocked access to numerous villages and driven residents from their homes, leaving some in crowded displacement camps and others continually moving.
More than a month after the outbreak began, officials fear the virus is spreading faster than response teams can contain it, and its full extent remains unclear.
“If you want to control an outbreak, especially Ebola outbreak, you must know the index case. We don’t have confidence on when this outbreak started,” Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director-General Dr. Jean Kaseya told The Associated Press last week.
