WHO declares global health emergency over Ebola outbreak in Congo and Uganda

ABUJA, Nigeria — The World Health Organization on Sunday declared the outbreak of Ebola virus disease caused by a rare virus in Congo and neighboring Uganda a public health emergency of international concern, after more than 300 suspected cases and 88 deaths.

The WHO said the outbreak does not meet the criteria for a pandemic emergency like that of COVID-19 and advised against closing international borders.

The WHO said on He said the patient had traveled to Ituri and that other suspected cases had also been reported in the province of North Kivu, one of the most populous in Congo and bordering Ituri.

On Sunday, the rebel government in Goma, eastern Congo’s largest city, said in a statement that the first confirmed case of Ebola had been detected in the city. The infected person came from Ituri province and was currently in isolation, the statement said. Goma was the scene of a rapid rebel offensive in early 2025, and the conflict between the Congolese armed forces and the Rwandan-backed M23 rebel paramilitary group has displaced hundreds of thousands of people.

Ebola is highly contagious and can be contracted through bodily fluids such as vomit, blood or semen. The disease it causes is rare, but serious and often fatal.

The WHO emergency declaration aims to spur donor agencies and countries into action. By WHO standards, this shows that the event is serious, there is a risk of international spread, and it requires a coordinated international response.

In a separate statement released on Sunday, the WHO Regional Office for Africa said a team of 35 experts from WHO and the Congolese Ministry of Health had arrived in Bunia, the capital of Ituri province, accompanied by 7 tonnes of emergency medical supplies and equipment.

The global response to the previous statements has been mixed. In 2024, when the WHO declared a global emergency over mpox outbreaks in Congo and elsewhere in Africa, experts at the time said it was doing little to quickly get supplies such as diagnostic tests, drugs and vaccines to affected countries.

Health authorities say the current outbreak, first confirmed Friday, is caused by the Bundibugyo virus, a rare variant of Ebola disease for which there is no approved treatment or vaccine. Although more than 20 Ebola outbreaks have occurred in Congo and Uganda, this is only the third time the Bundibugyo virus has been detected.

Congo accounts for all but two cases, both reported in Uganda, the WHO said.

The Bundibugyo virus was first detected in the Bundibugyo district of Uganda during an outbreak in 2007-2008 that infected 149 people and killed 37. The second time was in 2012, during an outbreak in Isiro, Congo, where 57 cases and 29 deaths were reported.

Dr. Richard Kitenge, chief of operations of the Public Health Emergency Operations Center, part of the National Institute of Public Health of Congo, recently arrived in Ituri. He said that while the risks may be high, Congo has weathered previous outbreaks.

“We have managed enough outbreaks in the country without treatment. The Zaire virus, which we managed, was also not treated in several outbreaks, and not everyone died,” Kitenge told the Associated Press.

Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director-General Dr Jean Kaseya said on Saturday that a high number of active cases remained in the community, particularly in Mongwalu, where the first cases were reported, “significantly complicating containment and contact tracing efforts”.

Violent conflict with militants, some supported by the Islamic State group, as well as constant population movements due to mining, both in Congo and across the Ugandan border, have also posed a major challenge to response efforts.

On Friday, authorities first reported the spread of the disease in Ituri province, close to Uganda and South Sudan. On Saturday, the Africa CDC reported 336 suspected cases and 87 deaths in Congo.

“There are currently significant uncertainties about the true number of people infected and the geographic spread associated with this event. In addition, understanding of the epidemiological links to known or suspected cases is limited,” said WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.

The two cases in Uganda include a person who authorities said had come from Congo and died in a hospital in the Ugandan capital, Kampala, and another person the WHO said had also come from Congo.

The WHO said the high percentage of positive cases among samples tested, the spread in Kampala and Uganda, and the clusters of deaths across Ituri “all indicate a potentially much larger outbreak than is currently detected and reported, with significant risk of local and regional spread.”

U.S. health officials describe the risk to Americans as low, but have not directly answered questions about whether Americans could have been exposed to Ebola in Africa.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is working with other health officials “to ensure the outbreak is managed and prevent further spread of Ebola,” Dr. Satish Pillai, head of the CDC’s response to the outbreak, said on a call with reporters Sunday.

The agency has a 30-person office in Congo and is working to deploy additional CDC workers to respond to the outbreak, Pillai said.

The agency issued travel advisories Friday urging Americans traveling to Congo and Uganda to avoid people with symptoms such as fever, muscle aches and rashes. The CDC is also “putting appropriate measures in place to identify people with symptoms” at ports of entry, Pillai said, but CDC officials did not immediately respond to follow-up questions seeking more details.

Kaseya said slow detection was delaying the response and giving the virus time to spread.

“This outbreak started in April. Until now, we don’t know the index case. That means we don’t know how big this outbreak is,” Kaseya said, using a term for the first detectable case of an outbreak.

The first known suspected case, a 59-year-old man, developed symptoms on April 24 and died in a hospital in Ituri on April 27.

By the time health authorities were first alerted to the outbreak on social media on May 5, 50 deaths had already been recorded, the Africa CDC said.

The WHO said at least four deaths have been reported among health workers with Ebola symptoms.

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Associated Press writer Mike Stobbe contributed from New York.