DR Congo confirms near record number of new Ebola cases
The number of new Ebola cases has accelerated during the past month and an emergency committee of World Health Organization experts said last month that the outbreak was likely to worsen significantly unless the response was stepped up.
A Congolese health worker administers Ebola vaccine to a woman who had contact with an Ebola sufferer in the village of Mangina in North Kivu province of the Democratic Republic of Congo, August 18, 2018.
Thirteen new cases of Ebola were confirmed on Wednesday in northeastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, one of the highest daily counts since the start of the outbreak in July, the health ministry said.
"It's pretty exceptional," health ministry spokeswoman, Jessica Ilunga, said, commenting on the data published in its daily bulletin on the epidemic.
Attacks by armed groups have hampered international efforts to control the outbreak, the worst in Congo’s history, which has infected over 380 people and killed two-thirds of them.
Treatment, vaccination programmes and safe burials of victims have been disrupted by a surge in violence and abiding local mistrust of health directives.
Last Wednesday, 12 Congolese soldiers were killed alongside seven UN peacekeepers in clashes with militias near the epicentre of the outbreak.
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