World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo is spreading rapidly on Monday [1].
The escalation of the virus in the region threatens to overwhelm local health systems and increase the mortality rate if containment efforts fail to accelerate.
Speaking from Geneva, Switzerland, Tedros said the WHO has upgraded the national risk assessment for the Democratic Republic of Congo to "very high" [3]. The Director-General said the virus is moving faster than current response efforts can manage [3].
Data regarding the scale of the outbreak varies by reporting source. Tedros said there are now almost 750 suspected cases and 177 suspected deaths [2]. Other reports indicate the total number of reported cases, including both confirmed and suspected instances, exceeds 900 [4].
Health officials said the rapid spread was due to specific failures in the early stages of the response. Testing delays and traditional burial practices allowed the virus to transmit between people before health authorities could raise alarms [5].
"The outbreak is spreading rapidly," Tedros said [3].
The WHO is now working to coordinate an emergency response to stabilize the affected areas. This includes improving the speed of diagnostic testing, and implementing safer burial protocols to prevent further community transmission [5].
“The outbreak is spreading rapidly.”
The upgrade to a 'very high' risk level indicates that the WHO believes the current containment strategy is insufficient. The combination of cultural burial practices and logistical delays in testing has created a window for the virus to establish a wider foothold in the population, shifting the operation from a localized containment effort to a larger national crisis.
