Speaker 1: The Democratic Republic of Kungu has now recorded more than
Speaker 1: four thousand confirmed ebola cases. The epidemic is now the
Speaker 1: second largest ebola outbreak ever recorded, and it's been called
Speaker 1: the fastest spread and ever. The World Health Organization has
Speaker 1: recommended a full skilled human trial of the only approved
Speaker 1: ebola vaccine to determine whether it can also protect against
Speaker 1: the deadly strain currently circulating in the DRC.
Speaker 2: Somber phased passengers away temperature checks after their boat was intercepted.
Speaker 2: Their journey took a turn when a man died after
Speaker 2: developing symptoms consistent with a bowler.
Speaker 3: They took our temperatures and asked us a few questions
Speaker 3: about how we are. I'm fine, except for little back pain.
Speaker 2: All two hundred passengers on board were screened by health
Speaker 2: workers upon arriving in Kinshasa. The checks come as the
Speaker 2: Democratic Republic of Congo stays on high alert following an
Speaker 2: ebola outbreak declared in May. Government data shows the virus
Speaker 2: has spread to five provinces in eastern Congo. Although the
Speaker 2: outbreak remains far from the capital, officials are stepping up precautions.
Speaker 2: Everyone arriving by boat in Kinshasa is now being streamed
Speaker 2: in an effort to keep the virus from spreading to
Speaker 2: the city, home to more than seventeen million people. But
Speaker 2: on the front line, many responders feel abandoned. They're working
Speaker 2: seven days a week without pay. Uiza Bondell is.
Speaker 1: One of them.
Speaker 2: He goes door to door tracking abola, entering homes where
Speaker 2: someone has died, and disinfecting everything left behind. In July,
Speaker 2: he joined other healthcare workers in a strike over unpaid
Speaker 2: wages and danger is working conditions.
Speaker 3: We work in risky situations. You may find yourself in
Speaker 3: a situation where a patient is vomiting blood and you
Speaker 3: have to clean it up. We face those kind of
Speaker 3: risks and we deserve both our allowance and our salary.
Speaker 2: However, the hardest part for him is the risk is
Speaker 2: taking not just for himself, but for his community.
Speaker 3: Become infected with the virus, and then I could infect
Speaker 3: my family and my neighbors.
Speaker 2: Who officials warned the outbreak is spreading faster than efforts
Speaker 2: to contain it. They are now urgent Congo to test
Speaker 2: available the only approved bowl of vaccine. The call comes
Speaker 2: as the death toll near two thousand.
Speaker 1: All right, for more of this let's bring in fresh Newport.
Speaker 1: She's the emergency coordinator for Doctess Without Borders currently based
Speaker 1: in Bunia in the Eastern DC. Hello Tresh, Welcome to
Speaker 1: the program we've had. This is the West Ebola outbreak
Speaker 1: in the dolc's history. How serious is the situation right now?
Speaker 4: The situation is so serious. We sees a number of
Speaker 4: cases increasing every day, about sixty percent of all of
Speaker 4: the deaths or community deaths. And what we know is
Speaker 4: that as long as people are dying in the community,
Speaker 4: the number of cases of Ebola is going to increase significantly.
Speaker 4: We see cases moving into new areas all of the time.
Speaker 4: And one thing that is extremely concerning is that there
Speaker 4: are areas where there's Ebola cases and there are not
Speaker 4: yet all of the pillars of outbreak response in that area.
Speaker 4: Some places there's not case management or surveillance or access
Speaker 4: to safe and dignified burials. And so as long as
Speaker 4: there's not a comprehensive popola response every single place where
Speaker 4: there's Ebola cases, we will see Ebola continuing to spread
Speaker 4: and the numbers in continuing to increase, in the number
Speaker 4: of deaths sadly increasing.
Speaker 1: I mean, it really does sound serious. What you're explaining
Speaker 1: to make matters. Whereas we know, there's currently no approved
Speaker 1: vaccine or specific treatment for the bundabougio ebola LA virus
Speaker 1: responsible for the current outbreak. Is that why it's so
Speaker 1: difficult to control also? Or what are some of the
Speaker 1: other key factors?
Speaker 4: I think one of the biggest key factors is this
Speaker 4: outbreak was identified very late. So usually when an outbreak
Speaker 4: is identified, you have a few cases, and at this
Speaker 4: point you're able to set things up. It's all in
Speaker 4: one place. You can really engage with the community, and
Speaker 4: you can train health workers as the number of cases increase,
Speaker 4: or hopefully you're able to stop it right away. When
Speaker 4: this outbreak started, there were more than three hundred suspect cases,
Speaker 4: more than fifty five deaths. It had spread to new areas,
Speaker 4: so to be able to scale up the response and
Speaker 4: train enough people from the very start was a challenge,
Speaker 4: and we've just never caught up to the outbreak since then.
Speaker 4: And Euri is an area with massive humanitarian needs, it's
Speaker 4: an area with ongoing conflict, areas that are insecure, and
Speaker 4: so this only adds challenge to the context.
Speaker 1: Right now, this takes me straight to Uganda really, which
Speaker 1: borders the DRC. Uganda recently declared itself ebola free, same variants,
Speaker 1: no treatments, no vaccine. So what did Uganda do better
Speaker 1: than the DC?
Speaker 4: In Uganda, it started very small. It was one case
Speaker 4: and then another case. And as I said, if you
Speaker 4: start very small, it's much much easier to control. In Uganda,
Speaker 4: as in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, they know
Speaker 4: how to respond to ebola. So in Uganda they were
Speaker 4: able to put all of the pillars of outbreak response
Speaker 4: into place immediately exactly where there were the Ebola cases.
Speaker 4: In the DRC. This hasn't been possible because it's spread.
Speaker 4: It's spread across across provinces, across across health zones, and
Speaker 4: it really makes it much much more difficult. All of
Speaker 4: the actors here on the ground are stretched to their limits.
Speaker 4: We see organizations reaching their capacity, but the number of
Speaker 4: Ebola cases continues to grow. It's growing much faster than
Speaker 4: the Ebola response is able to respond to.
Speaker 1: Right, I mean, what needs to happen now to stop
Speaker 1: this outbreak from getting worse.
Speaker 4: We need to have an increased amount of international resources
Speaker 4: that are coming into the country to help with the
Speaker 4: Ebola response. The Ministry of Health knows how to stop
Speaker 4: an Ebola outbreak, but there need to be more resources
Speaker 4: on the ground that are able to go to new
Speaker 4: areas where there are new cases, and we need to
Speaker 4: be focusing on prevention in areas where there are no
Speaker 4: cases right now, but at this moment, there's no capacity
Speaker 4: to do that.
Speaker 1: Wow, sounds really worse on the ground. Thanks for all
Speaker 1: that information, Trish Newport dot US Without Borders