A 26-year-old man became the first person to be infected with Ebola in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) since February, UN health officials declared on Friday. Regional health authorities later said the man had died from the virus.
“Unfortunately, this means the government of DRC will not be able to declare an end to the Ebola outbreak on Monday, as hoped,” said Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the head of the World Health Organization (WHO).
“Today I convened a meeting of the Emergency Committee on #Ebola in #DRC. After 52 days without a case, surveillance and response teams on the ground have confirmed a new case of Ebola in DRC. We have been preparing for and expecting more cases”
“Unfortunately, this means the government of #DRC will not be able to declare an end to the #Ebola outbreak on Monday, as hoped. But WHO remains on the ground & committed as ever to working with the government, affected communities & our partners to end the outbreak”-
“But the WHO remains on the ground and committed as ever to working with the government, affected communities and our partners to end the outbreak,” he added.
The ongoing epidemic was declared in August 2018 and has since killed 2,200 people. It also prompted a large vaccination effort which saw over 300,000 Congolese residents receive their immunizations.
After not seeing any infections for several weeks, however, authorities were preparing to declare the epidemic over. Commenting on the continuing outbreak, WHO Africa chief Matshidiso Moeti said he was “sad” to hear about the new infection, but pledged that the WHO would continue to work with the Congolese Health Ministry to “end Ebola.”
Source: DW
