The governor of Sud-Ubangui province, Jean-René Galekwa, officially announced the epidemic in the region after analyzing a suspected case. This declaration was made in an official statement.
According to Galekwa, an individual who died of Ebola in Sud-Ubangui had traveled extensively through several provinces of the DRC, some of which had not yet been affected by the disease.
The patient in question began showing symptoms in Kisangani, the capital of Tshopo province (located in the northeast), where there were already recorded cases of Ebola. Before that, he traveled through Rwanda and Uganda, and subsequently arrived in Ituri province (also in the northeast).
Furthermore, the patient passed through Lisala, a riverside area located in Mongala province (in the northwest). To date, authorities have reported that thirty-eight people who came into contact with the patient have been identified and are under quarantine.
The DRC had declared its seventeenth Ebola epidemic in mid-May, with a delay of several weeks. This disease, known for being extremely lethal, has already resulted in the death of over 15,000 people across the African continent in the last fifty years.
In the context of the current epidemic in the African country, the latest data released by Congolese authorities indicate a total of 3,310 deaths and 6,843 confirmed cases since the start of the outbreak.
The outbreak originated in Ituri province (northeast) and spread to remote and unstable areas in eastern and northern DRC, where the response capacity is being overwhelmed by the rapid increase in cases.
The Bundibugyo strain of Ebola, responsible for this epidemic, has no specific treatments available. However, the World Health Organization (WHO) is developing two vaccines that have entered phase one human trials, showing promising results so far, although the development process may take several months.
This epidemic constitutes the second deadliest in the history of the disease, surpassing the outbreak that occurred in the same region between 2018 and 2020. However, it still falls short of the most severe epidemic recorded, which caused approximately 11,000 deaths and 28,000 infections in West Africa between 2014 and 2016.
Additionally, the epidemic spread to neighboring Uganda, where the WHO declared the end of the outbreak on August 26, after recording 20 confirmed cases, including 15 imported from the DRC, of which two deaths were counted.