The Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has killed 2,325 people, surpassing the death toll of the 2018-2020 epidemic to become the deadliest in the country's history.
According to the latest report from the DRC's National Institute of Public Health released on Sunday, confirmed infections have risen to 4,945, with 101 new cases detected in the past 24 hours.
In a statement on Friday, Tom Fletcher, the UN's humanitarian relief chief, said: "This is the fastest-spreading outbreak ever recorded. We need speed, scale, and solidarity before the virus gets even further ahead of us."
This outbreak is the 17th in the DRC and has become the largest in the nation's history by case count, a milestone reached in late July. New government figures show the total death toll has surpassed the 2,299 deaths of the 2018-2020 outbreak, previously deemed the worst.
"Ebola is winning in the DRC. We cannot let the virus outpace our response," Fletcher emphasized while presenting the latest measures to control the disease.
On Wednesday, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus warned that at current rates, this outbreak could surpass the West African Ebola epidemic of 2014-2016, which claimed over 11,000 lives and spurred vaccine research.
The current outbreak is caused by the Bundibugyo Ebola strain, for which no vaccine or treatment is approved. The disease has spread rapidly since it was declared on May 15, hampered by weak healthcare infrastructure, the region's remoteness, and ongoing conflict near the borders with South Sudan, Uganda, and Rwanda.
The fatality rate among confirmed cases (case fatality ratio) has risen from about 20% in early June to 46%, according to government data, meaning nearly one in two confirmed infections now results in death.
Thomas Parisch, a public health expert deployed to the DRC with medical charity Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), said: "Usually, as an epidemic progresses, the death rate falls due to better contact tracing and earlier detection and treatment of patients. But instead, we still see many cases detected very late, when treatment is less likely to succeed, and many people are only identified after they die in the community."
Several experimental vaccines and therapies are being evaluated, while global health agencies consider whether existing Ebola treatments might offer protection. Evidence so far is limited to animal studies.
