Battling deadly Ebola outbreak in eastern Congo
Battling deadly Ebola outbreak in eastern Congo
At the epicentre of the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo, health care workers are racing to open new treatment centres and increase testing. But after years of war, the deadly virus is just one of the many challenges they face.
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“We are at one of four Ebola treatment centres in Bunia. A 48-year-old woman, a mother of five, has come here feeling unwell.
Doctors are asking questions and assessing her before taking her back to be tested for Ebola. “The woman is one of the first patients at the new treatment centre, which was built from the ground up less than 24 hours ago.
As soon as they took him to the isolation unit, he suffered a stroke. For a few tense moments, the doctors wait for him to stabilise before taking him for testing.
Doctors won’t know for several hours whether he’s positive or not. And yet, that’s an improvement from just two weeks ago, whethey concentrated testing in Kinshasa, 1,000 miles away, which delayedng critical diagnoses by several days.
“Is this a laboratory?” I ask. “This is the laboratory.” We are the first journalists here in Bunia to see laboratory workers testing the rare Ebola strain that has fuelled the outbreak. “We were very surprised by the speed of this outbreak.
I can say that we have a giant backlog of samples. We got overwhelmed with work here very quickly. So last week we were able to run 36 samples per day. And right now we are able to run 372 samples per day.” “
These samples from suspected Ebola cases have just come into this laboratory. Right now it takes about eight to 12 hours to get the test results, but they’re working to get that down to two hours.”
Reducing the time it takes to transport samples is essential to slowing the outbreak. At this clinic, the painstaking process of disinfecting the entire facility is underway after the deaths of two health care workers from Ebola.
New structures are also being built to isolate and test suspected Ebola cases and protect other patients. But beyond Ebola, medical workers here are also caring for victims of a broader war that hasn’t stopped just because a deadly virus is spreading.
Inside, we met a wounded Congolese soldier who asked us not to name him for fear of reprisal. He says Ebola has worsened an already dire situation after years of fighting.
