More than 2,000 people have died from Ebola in the Democratic Republic of the Congo since the first case of this epidemic was recorded in May. The Guardian's global health correspondent, Kat Lay, spoke to CDC Africa's Yap Boum II to understand why health teams on the ground are struggling and what is being put in place to try to contain the spread

• Ebola outbreak in Democratic Republic of the Congo now deadliest in country’s history

People fighting to contain rapidly growing outbreak in Democratic Republic of the Congo describe the obstacles and dangers they face

Every day, Sophie Mwadawa Kabundo goes to her job as a nurse at an Ebola treatment centre in the north-east of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, afraid she will contract the virus and pass it to her family and friends.

“More and more confirmed cases are being admitted here … Some of our colleagues have died,” said Kabundo. “We fear that, despite our vigilance, workplace accidents may occur and put us in ever greater danger … We go to sleep already worrying about the days ahead, as patients continue to pour in.”

On 23 August, it will be 100 days since the Bundibugyo strain was first reported. How did it became the DRC’s most deadly outbreak and what must be done to stop it becoming the world’s largest?

Almost 100 days ago, Africa’s public health watchdog reported an outbreak of Ebola in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

There have now been almost 5,000 cases and more than 2,000 deaths since 15 May, making this Ebola outbreak the biggest and most deadly in the DRC’s history.

The Trump administration’s ‘America first’ approach has contributed to the scale of the crisis now unfolding in one of the world’s poorest countries

For months health experts have warned that the scale of the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) could surpass the one that swept west Africa in 2014-16. This week, the authorities in the DRC announced that a grim milestone has already been passed: at least 2,325 people have died from the virus, making it the deadliest of the country’s 17 outbreaks and the fastest-growing in history.

There is no effective vaccine against Bundibugyo – a rare strain of the virus that spread fatally undetected during the spring, often being misdiagnosed as malaria or typhoid. In contrast to neighbouring Uganda, which succeeded in eliminating an outbreak, multiple factors are combining to let the disease rip through the DRC. The worst-affected region is contested by armed groups, and a context of population displacement and chronic insecurity has made monitoring and surveillance more difficult. Ebola treatment centres have been attacked as a result of misinformation and community distrust.

New species and regional instability are factors – but decisions made in the US and Britain are also costing lives

Did you know that there is a major Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and it’s on track to be the deadliest ever? It is already the second-worst Ebola outbreak in history, with the fastest community transmission we have ever seen. It’s estimated that there have been at least 4,900 cases and more than 2,300 deaths, giving a mortality rate close to 50%. The situation is bad. That’s the consensus among global health experts.

Yet this Ebola outbreak isn’t attracting much media or public attention. If I compare it with working on the 2014 Ebola outbreak, the current silence is astounding. That year, Ebola was one of the most Googled terms in the world, covered regularly on broadcast news in many countries outside the region, attracting newspaper headlines and magazine covers. Perhaps everyone is just tired of disease after the pandemic – Covid-19 fatigue, as it’s called. Trust me, no one wants to hear about infectious diseases.

Prof Devi Sridhar is chair of global public health at the University of Edinburgh

At least 2,325 people have died from the virus, according to official data, with outbreak on track to be biggest in history

The Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo is now the deadliest in the country’s history with at least 2,325 people dead, according to government data, surpassing the toll from the 2018-20 outbreak.

The DRC’s public health institute said confirmed cases had risen to 4,945, including 101 detected in the previous 24 hours.

Man dies in Bas-Uele after travelling from Haut-Uele, as head of WHO says outbreak on track to be deadliest ever

The Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo has spread to a sixth province, officials have said, a day after the head of the World Health Organization said the outbreak was on track to surpass the deadliest in history, which killed at least 11,000 people more than a decade ago.

The current outbreak has killed more than 2,100 people out of more than 4,500 cases, according to the latest government figures released on Tuesday. At the same point in the 2014-16 outbreak in west Africa, the previous most deadly outbreak, 755 cases had been recorded, according to WHO data.

Cases have passed 4,000 and health watchdog plans to go door to door to find patients in major response escalation

The virus causing a massive outbreak of Ebola in the Democratic Republic of the Congo could be mutating, health officials fear, as confirmed cases pass 4,000.

Africa’s public health watchdog said the time for incremental action was over as they announced plans to scale up every aspect of the response and go “door to door” looking for patients.

As the death toll rises to almost 1,500, and with a vaccine against the Bundibugyo strain potentially still months away, health workers face a battle to slow the outbreak

The latest numbers of confirmed cases of Ebola in the Democratic Republic of the Congo has made this latest outbreak the fastest growing in the known history of the virus.

At 3,360 confirmed cases, the disease is now affecting people in five provinces in the east of the DRC, with 1,487 deaths recorded, representing an overall case fatality rate estimated at about 45%, according to Congolese health officials. Health responses to the outbreak have been badly hampered by conflict in many of the affected areas.

Two drugs are being trialled in the Ituri region in a programme set up just six weeks after the outbreak was declared, with hopes it will reduce mortality rates

There is no approved drug to help the medical teams scrabbling to save lives in the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo – but there are hopes that could change within months as the first patients are enrolled in a treatment trial.

It is a record pace to set up and start this kind of research, scientists said, with patients enrolled just six weeks after the outbreak being declared a public health emergency of international concern by the World Health Organization (WHO) on 17 May.

The rapid spread of the virus has been intensified by misinformation and violence towards volunteers and treatment centres

Nearly two months after the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) confirmed an Ebola outbreak in one province, the virus is continuing to spread rapidly, reaching more parts of the country and infecting more people.

According to government data from 8 July, 1,759 cases and 600 deaths have been recorded. The virus has also spread to Uganda, where there have been 20 confirmed cases, including two deaths.

The hills of the Hauts Plateaux near Lake Tanganyika have been the scene of fighting for decades between the army, rebel forces and ethnic militias. Pushed one way and another by the conflict are families just trying to survive

The programme, aimed at keeping 1m girls in school across Africa, Asia and the Middle East, withdrawn after aid cuts

A leading higher education programme, aimed at keeping 1 million girls in school across Africa, Asia and the Middle East, has been axed by the British government just two years after it was announced.

The scheme, Strengthening higher education for female empowerment (SHEFE), which was unveiled with some fanfare two years ago by the outgoing Conservative government, had a £45m budget to increase access to higher education for 1 million students worldwide. It has now had its tender withdrawn, the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) said.

If we don’t know the source, not only do humans remain at risk but wildlife can suffer needlessly via retaliation

While virologists and public health departments were palpitating over the news of an Andes virus infectious disease outbreak on a cruise ship (13 cases, three deaths), in the Democratic Republic of the Congo the Bundibugyo virus, the root of the current Ebola outbreak (currently more than 1,250 cases and at least 362 deaths), was smouldering under the radar.

Bundibugyo virus is a horrifying, highly fatal pathogen. Symptom onset is sudden and includes headaches, diarrhoea, malfunctioning kidneys and liver, and, less frequently, internal and external bleeding (hence the term “haemorrhagic disease”). Grimly, contagiousness remains after death, meaning the family and loved ones of the deceased can be exposed when they wash and clothe the body in preparation for the funeral.

It’s got Europe’s largest Black population, the world’s second-biggest rap scene and a long literary history. But even as diasporic culture takes hold in Paris, some ask when commercial success will lead to structural change

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We often imagine Paris as a city of cafes, couture and impressionism. But some of its most dynamic cultural currents stem from the French-speaking Black diaspora.

This week, I spoke to Achille Tenkiang, a Cameroonian-American culture writer with a love for the city, and Liz Gomis, executive director of Maison des Mondes Africains (MansA), a cultural institution based in Paris. They told me how Black French culture has gained visibility in the capital and beyond.

Fears over ‘huge community transmission’ as modelling predicts thousands of deaths in DRC by September

The whereabouts of almost 300 people who have tested positive for Ebola in the Democratic Republic of the Congo is unknown, according to Africa’s top public health official.

The humanitarian crisis amid the conflict in the affected areas means more than 1 million people are living in camps to which health workers have no access, Dr Jean Kaseya, director general of the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), said on Thursday.

French health ministry says patient’s contacts are being traced and that risk to European public is very low

The first case of Ebola has been confirmed in France, the country’s health ministry has said, in a doctor who had returned from a humanitarian mission to an area affected by the outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

The patient was transferred to a specialist facility and was in a stable condition, the ministry said in a statement. “All precautionary measures, including the patient’s isolation, were taken upon his arrival in the country, with transfer to the hospital under secure conditions to prevent any risk of contamination.”

Number of people infected now tops 1,000 though health officials say the global risk remains low

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The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) will tap $107m in emergency funding for Ebola outbreak response in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Uganda, officials said on Thursday.

The continued Ebola outbreak in the DRC comes as Canada, Mexico and the US jointly host the Fifa World Cup, attracting visitors from around the world. The officials said the outbreak, now the third largest on record, required “strong immediate support”, but that the global risk remained low.

A headteacher, a motorcycle taxi driver and a travel agent are among those who are counting the human and economic cost of the virus

Justin Keno watches more than 400 pupils stream through the Nelson Mandela school’s gate each morning, and wonders which of them might be carrying Ebola.

The institution’s principal has done everything he can to prevent the spread of the virus: installing hand-washing basins at the entrance, providing alcohol-based hand rub for parents, making pupils bring packed lunches instead of eating in the canteen, and banning food sellers from outside the gates.

With more than 670 confirmed cases and over 135 deaths, the disease has yet to be contained amid funding shortfalls, fear and disinformation

When an orphanage in Bunia took in a newborn baby after his mother died from Ebola, the nuns who ran it hoped they were giving the infant a chance for life. The baby survived for only another two weeks. Now four of the nuns who cared for him have fallen sick with the deadly virus.

It is a snapshot of the tragedies at the centre of an outbreak in which the number of victims is roughly doubling every week, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).