WHO chief visits Congo Ebola epicentre Saturday to urge community action
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus arrived in Ituri on Saturday to back the response against a rare Ebola strain. With over 1,000 suspected cases and 246 deaths, Tedros emphasised the critical need for community work.
By Sertac Aktan with AFP, AP
Published on 30/05/2026 - 20:23 GMT+2
UN health chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus landed on Saturday in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo's Ituri province, the epicentre worst-hit by a severe outbreak of a rare type of Ebola.
The visit comes as the virus is spreading faster than the response can keep pace with, despite better-organised health facilities and new aid arriving.
The World Health Organisation's director-general is expected to visit a treatment centre and meet local authorities, health workers and affected families in Bunia, the provincial capital.
“The best way to address this is to provide all the necessary support to fight the disease at its epicentre and to continue offering every assistance needed,” Tedros told reporters. He added that the international community was helping the DRC government cope, but “at the same time, community ownership is important. We are here to discuss with the community, to see how the response is running and if there are challenges to help.”
Scale of the outbreak
The highly contagious haemorrhagic fever is already present in three eastern DRC provinces and in neighbouring Uganda. The true reach of the outbreak in the DRC, which is thought to have been circulating before it was detected, is likely to be much wider, the WHO has warned. The vast, unstable central African country has limited capacity to conduct laboratory tests to confirm cases.
As recent data highlights the mounting toll, there have been at least 1,077 suspected cases, including 246 deaths, according to the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention. The Ugandan Ministry of Health confirmed nine infections and one death on Friday.
WHO announced that a patient had recovered on Wednesday, left the hospital and was discharged into the community after two negative tests. WHO's Anais Legand told reporters in Geneva it marked the "first" among patients who had been confirmed Ebola carriers in the current outbreak.
Ebola, which is passed on through close contact and bodily fluids, has killed more than 15,000 people in Africa over the past 50 years. The deadliest outbreak in the DRC claimed nearly 2,300 lives out of 3,500 cases between 2018 and 2020.
Conflict and border closures
State services are largely lacking in Ituri province, where access is hindered by insecurity due to the presence of Islamic State-affiliated ADF militants and a coalition of ethnic militias that regularly kill civilians.
The nearby North and South Kivu provinces have also seen Ebola cases and have been plagued by near-continuous violence for three decades. Swathes of the region are controlled by the Rwanda-backed armed group M23, which has been battling government forces and has reported two cases in key cities under its control, including Goma and Bukavu.
Millions of people have fled the fighting and are living in displacement camps with poor hygiene conditions. Nearly a million of those displaced are in Ituri province, where the prospect of the epidemic spreading throughout the camps has sparked alarm.
"If Ebola comes, we'll be wiped out as we're packed like sardines," Dorcas Mapenzi said at the Kingonze camp on the outskirts of Bunia.
In response to the crisis, Uganda and Rwanda have closed their borders, with Uganda ordering a 21-day quarantine for anyone arriving from the DRC. Additionally, the Trump administration banned last week the entry of non-US passport holders who had recently visited Congo, Uganda, or South Sudan.
