Today's Edition
KINSHASA (AFP)
A new Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo that has caused scores of deaths has a "very high lethality rate" and no vaccine nor specific treatment, the country's health minister warned on Saturday.
"The Bundibugyo strain has no vaccine, no specific treatment," Kamba told a press briefing in Kinshasa.
"This strain has a very high lethality rate which can reach 50 percent," Samuel-Roger Kamba told a press briefing in Kinshasa.
Earlier Saturday, ministry officials said the death toll had already reached 80, up from 65 initially reported the previous day.
The strain has also claimed one life in neighbouring Uganda, officials said on Saturday, that of a DRC national.
That correlated with an announcement late Friday by Uganda's health ministry, which said a 59-year-old man from the DRC had died in Kampala after being admitted earlier in the week.
Tests showed the victim in Uganda was infected with the Bundibugyo strain, first identified in 2007.
Vaccines are only available for the Zaire strain, which was identified in 1976 and has a higher fatality rate of 60-90 percent.
African health officials had confirmed the latest outbreak Friday in Ituri province in northeastern DRC, bordering Uganda and South Sudan, according to the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC Africa).
According to Kamba, patient zero was a nurse who reported to a health facility in provincial capital Bunia on April 24, with symptoms suggesting Ebola.
Symptoms include fever, haemorrhaging and vomiting.
High risk of spread
The officials warned of a high risk of spread, with initially 65 deaths reported in the 17th outbreak to hit the DRC.
The country's health ministry said overnight the number of fatalities had risen to "246 suspected cases notified and 80 deaths".
"It is a large outbreak," said Jay Bhattacharya, acting director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Friday.
Ebola, believed to have originated in bats, is a deadly viral disease spread through direct contact with bodily fluids. It can cause severe bleeding and organ failure.
The virus spreads from person to person through bodily fluids or exposure to the blood of an infected persons, who become contagious only once they display symptoms.
The incubation period can last up to 21 days.
