More than a month into DR Congo Ebola outbreak, doctors warn 'this epidemic will last'

It was a rare moment of joy amidst the Ebola epidemic: Medical professionals broke into song and dance on June 16, 2026, to celebrate the successful treatment of three Ebola patients at the general hospital in Mongbwalu in the eastern part of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.  

The medical workers wear broad smiles – visible as they no longer have to wear masks – as they form a festive circle around a man, a woman and a child who have all obtained authorisation to leave the hospital. 

It is all the more meaningful for the health workers because the woman, Florance, is their colleague: she is the hospital's accountant. Florance contracted the virus while handling the bodies of deceased patients, who remain contagious even after death. Hospital doctor Héritier Masudi explained: 

"Florance spent a lot of time with the patients. One of her sisters had also become infected with the disease and died at our hospital. Florance didn't wait for symptoms to emerge; she sought treatment immediately." The first patients who have successfully been treated for Ebola left the hospital in Mongbwalu, the epicentre of the epidemic, on June 9. Our Observer, doctor Héritier Masudi, shared an image of the ceremony held to celebrate this moment, a breath of hope for the city.

The successful treatment and recovery of 14 patients in Mongbwalu provides a small breath of hope for the teams carrying out the response, which is only just now getting off the ground.

But medical professionals and humanitarian workers say that the situation remains dire in the 34 zones affected, more than a month after the epidemic was officially declared on May 17. More than 1,000 cases have been confirmed. A health worker stands in front of the building where suspected cases of Ebola are triaged in Mongbwalu on June 9, 2026.

'It's like we are blind'

Doctor Guyguy Manangama, an epidemiologist and the deputy director of operations at French medical charity Médecins sans Frontières (MSF), has been monitoring the response to the epidemic. Although he is based in France, he has been making frequent trips to the DRC:

"We don't have a good sense of how the cases have been distributed. It's like we are blind. Yes, the statistics from June 15 show that there have been around 837 confirmed cases and 196 deaths in 34 zones throughout the DRC [Editor's note: the numbers have since risen to 1,155 confirmed cases, including 304 deaths.] However, not all of the people who have died in recent weeks have been tested: some may have died from Ebola or perhaps it was malaria or another infection. There are also a lot of cases that are in zones that we can't reach for security reasons: in the mining communities, for example, where lots of people are crossing back and forth across borders."

The epidemic was officially declared by the Congolese government and the World Health Organisation (WHO) in mid-May 2026, but Doctor Manangama says that the alert had been received at the beginning of the month: 

"We are really behind because the epidemic was declared on May 17, and the investigation was launched afterwards. The WHO received the alert around May 5. We know that there were cases recorded well before that, in April, perhaps even early April. We don't know when the index case [Editor's note: patient zero, the first case identified in an epidemic] took place. We are really behind in this epidemic. Especially because it is rapidly evolving. And we know that 36 zones across two countries, Uganda and the DRC, have been affected."

'We've set up infrastructure for family visits'

Meanwhile, in Mongbwalu, Doctor Masudi says that, in spite of everything, the situation is stabilising now that humanitarian aid has arrived in the form of NGOs like MSF. Workers and equipment from the National Institute of Biomedical Research (INRB), the research laboratory of the DRC Health Ministry, also arrived on June 3. Now, Masudi and his team can detect cases more quickly: 

"Before, it was difficult because the samples would be sent to town, sometimes to Bunia or as far as the capital [Editor's note: Kinshasa].  And so some patients who were asymptomatic would leave the centre because you might have to wait up to two weeks for results. But since the INRB set up a lab here, we don't have that problem anymore."

Care for Ebola patients has also evolved since the 2014 epidemic. Doctor Manangama says both the development of treatments using monoclonal antibodies and changes to the way that treatment centres are run are important. 

"In 2014, Ebola treatment centres were completely closed off. The only people that the patients saw enter these structures were health professionals. They would be wearing full-body suits that made it look like they were from outer space. It was frightening for patients. So we've been reworking our strategy. We've now made it so patients inside the treatment centre can be seen from outside. We've also set up completely protected corridors, infrastructure for family visits.”

Sharp objects 

But Doctor Manangama says that one part of the response is still far behind: Contact tracing, or identifying anyone who has come into contact with someone who is sick. 

"Right now, we are at about 40% of the contacts being traced, but we'll need to be at between 90 to 95% in order to control the epidemic. If we aren't careful, we could reach record numbers of cases.”

On the ground, Doctor Héritier Masudi says that medical teams are also missing some basic supplies. The hospital doesn't have a blood bank. The few blood donors they have do it on a voluntary basis. They are also lacking electrolytes – mineral salts that are essential for cells, muscles and the heart to function, all of which are weakened by the vomiting and diarrhoea experienced by Ebola patients. 

Along with these medical difficulties, the staff is also faced with persistent hostility from part of the population, especially when they try to hospitalise suspected cases. 

"When we are on the ground, sometimes people will chase us away, wielding sharp objects,” the doctor says. “Some villages don't even want to see the vehicles of humanitarian organisations.” 

'Some people think that the illness is part of organ trafficking operations'

The single largest obstacle to containing the outbreak is, perhaps, suspicion from the population. Miel Kaghulalo, an activist with the citizen movement Lucha, is based in Bunia but travels regularly to Mongbwalu. He says that there is paranoia circulating in the communities affected.

"I've seen that people have doubts about the origins of the illness. They wonder if it is really Ebola that they are seeing [online or on the news] or if it is just doctored images. Some of them think that the illness is somehow a ruse by organ traffickers. But our organisation has observed that it really is an Ebola outbreak."

This restive suspicion comes to a head around burials, especially those carried out by medical professionals for health and safety reasons, following a procedure considered “safe and dignified". Kaghulalo explains:

"People struggle to accept that their loved ones are being buried by strangers in conditions that they've never seen before. It's just like all of a sudden, out of the blue, a loved one passes away, and you are told that you are not allowed to touch their body.”

In early June, attacks were carried out on one treatment centre in Rwampara and another in Mongbwalu.

The response to this issue, says Guyguy Manangama, must involve the community. It involves working with local leaders and traditional healers, as well as relying on patients who have been successfully treated who go on to become the best spokespeople for the response: 

"The patients who are going back into the communities are our ambassadors. They can speak about the quality of the care they received, to help us dissipate all of the rumours.” 

Thank you to photojournalist Bénédiction Murhabazi for sharing his videos. You can find more of his work here.

This article has been translated from the original in French by Brenna Daldorph.