The World Health Organization (WHO) approved clinical trials for two new Ebola vaccines on Wednesday, as an outbreak in Africa has killed more than 5,300 people. The candidates are ChAdOx1 BDBV, developed by the University of Oxford with the Serum Institute of India, and Moderna’s mRNA-1469, both designed specifically for the Bundibugyo virus. WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the trial that began last month with the Ervebo vaccine does not cover the Bundibugyo virus and that the agency’s expert groups now recommend adding the two candidates to the study. The National Institute for Biomedical Research of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) leads the trial, backed by partners including WHO. The Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) said on Monday that the epidemic had killed more than 5,300 people, the majority in the DRC, with 10,444 confirmed cases and a fatality rate above 50 percent.
Theme: Democratic Republic of the Congo
The World Health Organization (WHO) said cholera has killed around 1,800 people in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) so far this year, a country also battling its deadliest Ebola outbreak, according to AFP, in a text republished by Medical Xpress. Some 60,000 cases of the disease have been recorded in what the WHO chief, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, described as the country’s “worst cholera outbreak in decades.” Most of the infections were detected in the eastern provinces of North and South Kivu, prey to a litany of armed groups and partly under the control of the Rwanda-backed M23 militia, Tedros said. He said the concern now is that cases are following the Congo River basin, which means the outbreak could stretch up to Kinshasa. The mortality rate is around 3%, which is high for cholera.
A British healthcare worker infected with Ebola in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is being medically evacuated to Britain, in stable condition, expected to arrive on Wednesday or Thursday, according to an official document seen by Reuters. The British government confirmed that a British citizen in the DRC had tested positive and said the risk to the UK public remains low. It is the first case involving a British national linked to the current outbreak, and the patient had been sent to the DRC by a humanitarian organization. The outbreak is the second-largest on record, with more than 10,000 confirmed cases and nearly 5,000 deaths reported by late October.
The World Health Organization (WHO) approved clinical trials for two new Ebola vaccines as part of the effort to control an outbreak that has killed more than 5,300 people in Africa. WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the two candidates are ChAdOx1 BDBV, developed by the University of Oxford with the Serum Institute of India, and Moderna's mRNA-1469, developed specifically for the Bundibugyo virus. The National Institute of Biomedical Research of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is leading the trial, with support from partners including WHO; in October a trial had already begun with the Ervebo vaccine, approved for Ebola virus but not for Bundibugyo. The Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention said on Monday that the epidemic had killed more than 5,300 people, the vast majority in the DRC, with 10,444 confirmed cases and a fatality rate above 50%.
The National Basketball Association (NBA) removed Rwanda’s army team, the Armée Patriotique Rwandaise (APR), from the Basketball Africa League (BAL) because of US sanctions imposed on the country in March. Mark Tatum wrote that APR would remain “ineligible to compete in the BAL while these sanctions remain in effect”. Last week, the US also imposed new sanctions on Rwanda’s defense ministry over its support for the M23 rebel group, which controls parts of eastern DR Congo.
Congolese opposition figure Prince Epenge, arrested on October 25, was transferred on October 31 to Makala central prison, in Kinshasa, after a court rejected his request for provisional release the day before. President of the ADD Congo party, spokesperson for the Lamuka coalition and a member of the C64 platform, Epenge is accused of “spreading false rumors”, tied to his denunciation of the killing of a party activist at the September 15 opposition march in Kinshasa. He was detained at N’djili International Airport as he was about to fly to Rome, where the opposition gathered in C64 was to hold a meeting.
The Ebola outbreak has killed 5,376 people — 5,372 in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and two each in Kenya and Uganda, with 10,414 confirmed cases in the country as of October 30. The current outbreak is caused by the Bundibugyo strain, with no known vaccine or treatment.
The Ebola death toll in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has passed 5,000, according to government data cited by Al Jazeera, in an outbreak declared in May that is already the country’s deadliest on record. More than 10,000 people have been infected, and there are no approved treatments or vaccines against the rare Bundibugyo strain.
The death toll from the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo has surpassed 5,000, government data showed on Friday, Reuters reported.
The Democratic Republic of the Congo’s (DRC) foreign minister told AFP on Thursday that US sanctions on Rwanda were justified, because Kigali had failed to withdraw its troops from Congolese territory as pledged, in an article republished by the Hindustan Times. The United States imposed sanctions on Wednesday on Rwanda’s defense ministry and a financial institution in the country over their alleged ties to the armed group M23 fighting in the DRC.
The US Treasury sanctioned Rwanda's Ministry of Defense and the Zigama Credit and Savings Society, a Rwandan financial institution that, according to the department, played a key role in facilitating Rwanda's support for the March 23 Movement (M23) and its political wing, the Congo River Alliance. According to the BBC, the Treasury says the Rwandan ministry directed thousands of troops to fight alongside M23 in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), providing weapons, equipment, logistics and training.
Health authorities in the Democratic Republic of the Congo recorded 10,060 confirmed Ebola cases, including 4,887 deaths, as of October 25, with a fatality rate of 48.6 percent, according to a report cited by Xinhua. The outbreak involves the Bundibugyo virus, with no approved vaccine or specific treatment, and was described as the fastest-growing Ebola outbreak in history by the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, according to the agency. Kenya confirmed nine infections, including two deaths, after a patient traveled from DR Congo through Uganda to Nairobi, according to AllAfrica.
The Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has topped 10,000 confirmed cases, government data showed Tuesday, as health authorities race to slow the spread of the disease in several African countries, according to AP, in a text published by NBC News. It is the fastest-growing Ebola outbreak in history, and nearly half of the 10,060 people confirmed to have the virus have died, according to data from Congo's Ministry of Health.
Angry youths armed with machetes attacked two community health workers raising awareness about the Ebola outbreak in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, killing one and wounding the other, Reuters reported.
Ebola deaths in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) have reached 4,803 and infections 9,876, with a fatality rate of 48.6%, according to TASS. As of October 25, the death toll was double that of the 2018–2020 outbreak, according to Yonhap.
A nurse was killed and another health worker was severely injured while responding to an Ebola alert in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, according to Al Jazeera, citing the World Health Organization; the attack took place on Saturday in the town of Bafwasende in Tshopo province, according to Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus; data from the country’s Ministry of Health indicate more than 9,800 cases, including more than 4,700 deaths, since the outbreak began in May, the deadliest in the country’s history.
The World Health Organization (WHO) announced the start of the first clinical trial of an Ebola vaccine in the outbreak that began in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), according to Al Jazeera. Trial participants were vaccinated with the Ervebo vaccine in Bunia, the capital of Ituri province and the epicenter of the outbreak. The DRC declared its 17th and worst-ever Ebola outbreak in May and has since reported more than 9,700 cases, with deaths exceeding 4,600.
The Ebola patient in Nigeria is a Swiss woman, the wife of a Swiss diplomat, who has not travelled to the epicentre of the current outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and is believed to have contracted the virus while travelling with her husband in Uganda, the Swiss foreign ministry has said. The Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention is investigating whether the patient may have come into contact with an Ebola patient in Kenya, as both travelled from Uganda's Entebbe airport on October 3. The World Health Organization (WHO) said investigations were continuing to establish the likely source of infection for the Ebola patient in Nigeria.
The Swiss government said the Ebola patient in Nigeria, the Ugandan-born wife of a Swiss diplomat based in Abuja, did not travel to the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), contradicting accounts from Uganda, according to Reuters. Ugandan authorities have said the woman who fell ill in Nigeria had travelled to eastern Congo, where the outbreak was declared in mid-May and has since become the fastest-spreading on record.
The World Health Organization (WHO) classified the Ebola outbreak in Africa as complex after the disease spread to Nigeria, according to AFP. In its latest weekly bulletin, WHO Africa reported 9,637 confirmed cases and 4,646 deaths, a crude fatality ratio of 48.2% — an increase of 572 cases and 265 deaths since External Situation Report #22.
Kenya has confirmed a new Ebola case, bringing the total number of infections in the country to nine, amid an outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), according to Al Jazeera.
The Ebola outbreak in Congo has reached the country’s eighth province, Nord-Ubangi, on the border with the Central African Republic, where the Health Ministry recorded two cases, one of them fatal, in men in their 20s in the Wapinda health zone, according to the Korea Herald. Since the outbreak was declared in mid-May, authorities have recorded at least 9,400 cases and more than 4,500 deaths, the deadliest toll in Congo’s history.
Former president Joseph Kabila announced on October 12, in Goma, a new political-military alliance with the Rwanda-backed M23 armed group, according to France 24. The deal was presented at a joint press conference at his residence in Goma, a city under the group’s control since January 2025, and Kabila leads the Front for the Refoundation of the Nation (FRN), according to Deutsche Welle.
Former Democratic Republic of Congo President Joseph Kabila has been named the leader of a new rebel coalition seeking to oust the government, according to the BBC. The Front for the Refoundation of the Nation (FRN) said it aims to coordinate “resistance forces” to end “tyranny” in the country and will pursue the goal “by all means, including force”. The coalition was announced at a press conference at Kabila’s residence in Goma, the largest city in eastern DR Congo, which has been under the control of the M23 since last year.
Former Democratic Republic of the Congo president Joseph Kabila will lead a new political-military movement with the Rwanda-backed M23 armed group, according to France 24. The alliance was presented at a joint press conference at Kabila’s residence in Goma. The Associated Press reported that Kabila launched on Monday a new political and military coalition of groups opposed to the current government.
The World Health Organization (WHO) said the Alimbongo health zone, in North Kivu province in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), reported ebola cases for the first time, with four confirmed cases and two deaths as of October 6, according to Al Jazeera. The WHO also recorded 8,728 confirmed cases and 4,205 deaths in the DRC as of October 6. The same day, Kenya confirmed its first imported case of Bundibugyo virus disease, also according to the WHO.
Erik Prince signed a wide-ranging contract in late 2024 to provide security and mining services to the government of Democratic Republic of the Congo President Félix Tshisekedi, according to The New York Times.
Kenya has confirmed its first case of Ebola, a Kenyan citizen who had been living in the Democratic Republic of Congo for the past seven years, the BBC reported. The patient died days after arriving in Nairobi. Health Minister Duale said 28 contacts have been identified so far, including family members and health workers. The DRC has recorded more than 8,000 cases and over 4,000 deaths, according to The Guardian.
A vessel carrying fish traders capsized in Lake Kivu in eastern Congo, killing at least 12 people and leaving dozens missing, authorities said on Sunday. The vessel was carrying more than 50 people when it capsized on Saturday night near Idjwi Island in South Kivu province; about 15 people were rescued, according to Félix Habiragi, chief of the nearby village of Kisheke.
A plane travelling from Kikwit to Kinshasa crashed while trying to land in Kenge, in Kwango province, after a technical fault, according to Al Jazeera. Everyone on board died — 12 bodies were burned beyond recognition and the pilot’s lifeless body was found outside the aircraft. Fourteen people died, including two senior military officials, according to The Hindu. An investigation has been opened into the cause of the accident.
The World Health Organization (WHO) said on Friday, September 25, 2026, that the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has reached two new health zones: Bulu, in South Ubangi governorate, on the border with the Central African Republic, and Dungu, in Haut-Uele province, on the border with South Sudan. The additional cases bring the number of affected health zones to 63 across seven provinces, as authorities struggle to control the outbreak. As of September 23, the DRC had reported 7,890 confirmed cases and 3,799 deaths, according to the WHO.