Africa CDC said Friday it is monitoring a confirmed Ebola Virus disease outbreak in Ituri Province in northeastern Democratic Republic of the Congo. The count is now in the hundreds, with the agency placing suspected infections at about 246 and deaths at 65 across Mongwalu and Rwampara.
The numbers remain provisional. The agency said early testing by Congo’s national biomedical institute has returned 13 Ebola-positive results from the first 20 samples analyzed. Sequencing is still underway, with the agency saying early results suggest a non-Zaire ebolavirus.
The headline figure of 65 deaths also needs qualification. Africa CDC said 4 deaths have been reported among laboratory-confirmed cases.
Bunia is also part of the watch list, though those cases have not yet cleared confirmation.
Africa CDC’s concern is less about a single remote cluster than about where the clusters sit. Ituri is affected by insecurity, population movement, and commercial mobility, specifically pointing to mining-related movement in Mongwalu, the urban setting of Bunia and Rwampara, gaps in contact listing, infection prevention challenges, and proximity to Uganda and South Sudan.
That combination turns a health-zone outbreak into a regional logistics test. Ebola is contained through speed: identifying cases, isolating patients, tracing contacts, controlling infection in health facilities, engaging communities, and ensuring safe burials. Africa CDC said those pillars are now the focus of an urgent high-level coordination meeting with health authorities from DRC, Uganda, and South Sudan, alongside WHO, UNICEF, CDC counterparts in US, Europe, and, the Public Health Agency of Canada, MSF, IFRC, the World Bank, Gavi, CEPI, and pharmaceutical and diagnostics companies.
One of the biggest unresolved questions is the virus species. The previous DRC outbreak, declared in September 2025 in Kasai Province, involved the Zaire strain and was declared over by the Ministry of Health on December 1, 2025 after 64 cases, including 53 confirmed, 11 probable, and 45 deaths. WHO said no new confirmed cases had been reported after September 25, 2025, and the final patient was discharged on October 19, 2025.
The Ituri outbreak appears different at this stage. Africa CDC said the preliminary finding suggests a non-Zaire ebolavirus, with sequencing expected to further characterize the strain.
WHO describes Ebola as a severe, often fatal disease that spreads through direct contact with bodily fluids of infected people, contaminated materials, or people who have died from the disease.
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