The Ebola virus in DR Congo kills one person every 30 minutes, the head of UN humanitarian affairs warned on Friday August 15, as the epidemic spread to a 6th province. The latter called on the international community to “wake up and mobilize”.
“Ebola is gaining ground in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DR Congo). We cannot let the virus outpace our response,” Tom Fletcher said in a statement released after an emergency meeting with UN agency officials.
DR Congo declared a 17th Ebola epidemic on May 15. Three months later, the health response is still struggling to catch up with the virus, with health structures in the country among the poorest in the world suffering from a general lack of resources.
The epidemic “is the fastest ever recorded”, it “kills one person every 30 minutes”, underlined Tom Fletcher.
“More than 2,000 people have already died. Many more are in danger. The world must wake up and mobilize,” he asked.
The deadliest Ebola outbreak known to the country left nearly 2,300 dead for 3,500 patients recorded between 2018 and 2020.
The current epidemic has caused more than 2,128 deaths, out of 4,566 confirmed cases, just three months after its declaration, according to the latest report published by the Congolese authorities.
“I deployed 20 additional staff members to the front line today. But it is a wake-up call. We need speed, large-scale resources and solidarity” to prevent “this virus from getting even further ahead of us,” said Tom Fletcher.
It also allocated an additional $30.5 million (€26.4 million) from the United Nations Central Emergency Response Fund (CERF) to support the health response. “This sum is in addition to the 24 million dollars (20.7 million euros) previously allocated to the Democratic Republic of Congo and four neighboring countries” to deal with the epidemic, he said.
Of the 518 million dollars (448 million euros) needed for the joint preparedness and response plan launched at the beginning of June by the African Union health agency (Africa CDC) and the World Health Organization (WHO) in the face of the epidemic, only 264 million dollars (228 million euros) have so far been mobilized, the WHO alerted on Wednesday.
No vaccine or specific treatment is currently available for the Bundibugyo variant involved in the epidemic
With AFP
