Listen to this article
Average 3 minutes
The audio version of this article was created by AI-based technology. It can be mispronounced. We are working with our partners to continuously review and improve the results.
The number of confirmed Ebola cases in Congo has reached 2,011, including 754 deaths, according to government data released overnight in what authorities say is the fastest-growing outbreak in history.
Health workers at Bunia General Hospital, the largest medical facility in the region, went on strike on Wednesday and are the latest group to walk off the job due to pay issues. Health professionals and other frontline workers closed the door of the hospital saying they have never received compensation despite working under difficult conditions.
The World Health Organization (WHO) says that more than 100 health workers have contracted the disease since the disease began.
The central African nation has been battling an Ebola outbreak caused by the rare Bundibugyo virus since May 15. 753 patients are still in isolation or in hospitals, and 366 have so far recovered, according to data from the Congolese Ministry of Health. Contact tracing is still a challenge, with detection of those exposed still at 67 percent.
The outbreak continues to spread faster than health officials can track despite a mounting response. At least 80 percent of new cases come from unknown chains, the WHO said on Tuesday.
The biggest challenge is that health officials have yet to see a patient who has contracted the disease, and displacement from armed conflict and mining-related movements has made it difficult to track the thousands who have come into contact with infected people.
The current outbreak of Ebola in the Democratic Republic of Congo is not the first, but the new strain, the lack of tools and the war are making it worse. Nationally, CBC’s Eli Glasner talks to doctors on the ground about what they’re up against and why they say foreign aid cuts increase the risk.
Many of the newly reported deaths are those who died in their communities without ever reaching a health center and not receiving help, said Dr. Chikwe Ihekweazu, who is an emergency health officer at the WHO, on Tuesday after returning from Bunia in Ituri, which is the province most affected by the disease.
The health response is hampered by funding gaps, attacks on health facilities, ongoing conflict in eastern Congo, and mistrust among local communities.
Scores of health workers at the Ebola treatment center in Rwampara, another hard-hit town in Ituri province, went on strike over non-payment of salaries and bonuses on Monday. On Tuesday they agreed to resume work under the condition that the government will pay them within 72 hours.
Some told The Associated Press that they have not received a paycheck since they started working at the beginning of the pandemic.
Response efforts have also been challenged by the lack of approved vaccines or treatments for the Bundibugyo virus, unlike the much more common Zaire virus that has its own vaccine and which caused most of Congo’s 16 outbreaks.
Signing up for a much-anticipated trial of two potential Ebola drugs just started in Ituri.
