The death toll from the Ebola outbreak in Africa has passed 5,300, with nearly all deaths in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, according to the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC)
The agency's data on Monday put deaths at 5,376: 5,372 in the DRC and two each in Kenya and Uganda. Africa CDC said the Bundibugyo strain behind the outbreak has infected about 10,444 people across the DRC, Uganda and Kenya, with a death rate above 50 per cent.
Figures differ by source. The DRC's health ministry, cited by the BBC on Oct. 31, reported more than 5,000 deaths, more than 10,300 confirmed cases and a case fatality rate of 48.6 per cent. It said eight of the country's 26 provinces are affected, with Ituri province in the north-east, a conflict zone, remaining the epicentre.
The DRC declared the outbreak in mid-May, its 17th. Public health officials said it became the country's deadliest in August. The previous deadliest, between 2018 and 2020, recorded 2,299 deaths, according to the United Nations. The UN has warned the current outbreak is "taking lives at a much faster rate."
There is no approved treatment or vaccine for Bundibugyo. Clinical trials have begun in recent weeks with the Ervebo vaccine, which has worked against the more common Zaire strain.
Uganda recorded 20 cases, almost all in people who had travelled from the DRC, before being declared Ebola-free in August. Travel restrictions remain for people crossing from the DRC. Kenya recorded nine infections and two deaths in October, its first Ebola cases.
In Nigeria, health authorities said two rounds of testing on two suspected cases in the northeast came back negative. Nigeria reported an imported case in October, its first in more than a decade, and the patient, a woman, was flown to Switzerland for treatment. A health worker returning from the DRC was reported with a single case in France in July.
Responders have also come under attack. Earlier this week a nurse was killed and another health worker seriously injured while answering an Ebola alert, after local youths accused them of contaminating water sources, according to UN-backed Radio Okapi. A politician was beaten to death last month after backing prevention measures, the BBC reported.
Dr. Jean Kaseya, director-general of Africa CDC, told CBC News the outbreak could spread to more countries and other continents without more international support. "No one is safe today," he said.
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