Ebola outbreak collides with armed conflict in eastern Congo

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the WHO Director-General, said this week that the convergence of disease and warfare in the eastern provinces of the Democratic Republic of Congo presents an unprecedented challenge to outbreak control. Armed groups operating across North Kivu and Ituri provinces have restricted the movement of health teams and disrupted vaccination campaigns, allowing the virus to spread unchecked in several communities.

The current Ebola outbreak, which emerged in early May, has already claimed at least fifteen lives according to the latest WHO epidemiological report. Health authorities have struggled to identify and isolate new cases because conflict-affected populations distrust government health workers and armed groups have attacked vaccination teams in some areas.

The situation echoes the 2018-2020 outbreak in the same region, which killed more than two thousand people and was complicated by militia activity and community resistance to containment measures. Humanitarian organisations on the ground report that the current security environment is even more fragmented, with multiple armed factions controlling different territories.