BUNIA, Congo (AP) — Congo’s Ebola outbreak has killed at least 2,000 people, the latest figures show, making it the fastest-growing outbreak ever recorded as health teams face rebel violence, poor roads and work stoppages tied to pay disputes while trying to reach remote communities.
Government data released overnight into Tuesday put the total number of confirmed cases at 4,381, with 2,011 deaths.
From the first confirmed case, the outbreak reached that death toll nearly three times faster than the 2014-16 Ebola epidemic, which remains the deadliest in history.
Authorities declared the current outbreak on May 15, though health officials say genetic sequencing indicates it had already been spreading for months, beginning in February.
The pace has accelerated sharply: it took roughly nine weeks to reach the first 1,000 deaths, but only about three more weeks for that number to double, underscoring how quickly the crisis is outpacing efforts to trace and contain it.
Dr. Jean-Marie Akandabo, who is helping treat patients at a local clinic in Ituri, called the 2,000-death milestone “alarming” and said response operations must be intensified in affected areas.
The outbreak is already the second-largest ever recorded, surpassed only by the 2014-2016 West Africa epidemic, which caused more than 28,000 cases and over 11,000 deaths.
Unlike many earlier Ebola outbreaks, this one is being driven by the rare Bundibugyo virus, for which there are no approved vaccines or treatments.
Clinical trials for those have begun in Ituri province, the epicenter of the outbreak, in eastern Congo.
Aid workers say the outbreak that’s been expanding across five eastern provinces affected continues to outpace response.
Many health workers have gone on strike to protest lack of payment for their work since the outbreak was declared, which authorities have blamed on logistical challenges in disbursing available funds.
And WHO has said most new cases are still being recorded outside of contacts being monitored, showing that transmission remains out of the control of health workers.
This outbreak has killed a percentage of cases because of limited care
Ebola can be caused by different types of virus. Although the type responsible for the 2014-2016 outbreak is considered the deadliest, government data shows this Bundibugyo outbreak has killed a higher percentage of people as care and support are not getting to patients quickly enough.
Many cases are reporting symptoms late or not at all.
The ongoing outbreak has so far had a case fatality rate of 45.9%, more than the 39.6% rate recorded in the 2014-2016 West Africa outbreak.
“In the absence of an effective vaccine, control (for the outbreak) rests on identifying cases and then nursing them in secure facilities until they recover or sadly perish,” said Paul Hunter, a professor in medicine at the University of East Anglia in the UK.
In a remote region like this with an ongoing conflict and interrupted communications, routine surveillance can be very difficult and “identifying cases early enough to prevent spread can be impossible,” said Hunter.
Authorities have restricted public gatherings and shut the main airport in Ituri to limit spread of the disease.
But mass movements due to trade, mining and displacements from conflict have continued in the area near the borders of South Sudan, Uganda and Rwanda.
‘No one is safe’
Dr. Akandabo in Ituri said that the major challenges he’s seen are the limited care for patients and poor community engagement.
“We must not take this disease lightly, because it continues to kill and no one is safe,” said Akandabo.
The World Health Organization said on Monday that at the onset of the outbreak in one of Congo’s most remote and vulnerable areas, some cases were wrongly attributed to malaria and typhoid, and that early testing was conducted for the more common type of Ebola.
The WHO regional director for Africa, Dr. Mohamed Yakub Janabi, told a news conference that officials are “chasing the virus, the virus is ahead of us.”
The first Ebola virus to be identified was in 1976 near the Ebola River in what is now Congo.
The current outbreak is the 17th — and largest — the Central African nation has faced.
