254 Dead but "Index Case Still Unknown" as Ebola Outbreak Reaches Record Severity

1,003 Confirmed Cases and 254 Deaths
Difficulties Tracking More Than 35,000 Contacts

The number of confirmed Ebola cases in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DR Congo) has surpassed 1,000 as the outbreak continues to spread. The death toll has reached 254, and health authorities believe the outbreak has not yet reached its peak.

According to the Associated Press on the 22nd (local time), the Ministry of Health of DR Congo announced in a statement released the previous night that there were 1,003 confirmed cases of Ebola and 254 deaths in the eastern region.

On the 29th of last month (local time), medical staff were transporting meals to patients at the Ebola treatment center in Lewambara, Congo. Photo by AP Yonhap News.

According to the Ministry of Health of DR Congo, the Ebola outbreak was declared in Ituri Province on the 15th of last month. Since then, 100 people have recovered, but at least 365 people are still hospitalized or in isolation.

This outbreak was caused by the Bundibugyo virus, a rare strain for which there are no approved vaccines or treatments. While no vaccine has yet been approved for the Bundibugyo strain, experimental vaccine development is underway.

Health authorities assessed that the rate of spread during the first month of the outbreak was among the worst on record. They also believe that many patients have not yet been identified and that the peak of the outbreak has not been reached.

Health authorities have not yet identified the index case for this outbreak. As of last week, they explained that tracking must continue for more than 35,000 people who have been identified as having had contact with infected individuals.

Health authorities are also facing difficulties in contact tracing due to security instability in the eastern region. In Ituri Province, attacks by the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), an Islamist militant group linked to the Islamic State (IS), have blocked access to several villages. As a result, residents have fled their homes, with some staying in overcrowded shelters and others continuing to move from place to place.

More than a month has passed since the outbreak was declared, but health authorities still cannot keep up with the pace of infection spread and believe the actual scale of the outbreak is not yet fully understood.

Jean Kaseya, Secretary-General of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC), told the Associated Press, "To control the Ebola outbreak, we need to know who the first patient was, but we are not even sure when this outbreak began."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.