African health leaders and global partners have agreed to strengthen regional coordination and resource mobilisation to contain the ongoing Bundibugyo Ebola outbreak affecting the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Uganda, while also safeguarding essential services such as education and routine healthcare, including continued efforts to contain cholera, measles and other outbreaks on the continent.
The commitments were endorsed during a high-level ministerial cross-border coordination meeting convened in Kampala by the Director General of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC), Dr Jean Kaseya, together with ministers of health from the DRC, Uganda and South Sudan, alongside the World Health Organization (WHO), UNICEF, the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) and technical partners.
The meeting focused on strengthening surveillance, harmonising preparedness measures across borders, sustaining frontline services and reinforcing regional solidarity in the face of a growing outbreak.
Leaders stressed that the outbreak is unfolding in a region characterised by intense cross-border movement, insecurity and limited access to approved vaccines or therapeutics for the Bundibugyo strain, underscoring the importance of a coordinated regional response.
Speaking during a media briefing after the meeting, Dr Kaseya said the scale and trajectory of the outbreak required sustained continental solidarity and coordination.
“This outbreak is not a DRC issue, it is a regional issue,” Dr Kaseya said. “Those who believe that it is a DRC issue will be surprised, as it was during COVID. We need to take it as a regional, even continental issue, and deal with that.”
So far, the outbreak has resulted in 96 confirmed cases and 11 confirmed deaths across the DRC and Uganda, with an additional 867 suspected cases and 204 suspected deaths under investigation.
The DRC’s Minister of Health, Dr Roger Kamba, said insecurity and laboratory limitations had complicated the response during the early phase of the outbreak. “The delay was due to the fact that the laboratory in Bunia could not detect the Bundibugyo strain, and it was necessary to send the samples to Kinshasa,” he said.
Dr Kamba also said the DRC government was engaging diplomatic and mediation channels, including international partners, to facilitate access and coordination in areas under M23 control so that Ebola response activities could continue across affected regions. He stressed that a unified response across all affected territories was essential to containing the outbreak.
The meeting endorsed a unified continental response framework built around a “one team, one plan, one budget and one implementation model” under the continental Incident Management Support Team (IMST) jointly coordinated by Africa CDC and WHO. President Yoweri Museveni offered to host the IMST in Kampala.
Emergency Director at WHO-AFRO Dr Marie Roseline Belizaire said the response would depend on close coordination and solidarity among countries and partners. “No single agency, no single country can respond to this magnitude of outbreak alone,” she said. “Coordination, solidarity and collaboration are critical to this response.”
Participants agreed on a broad package of regional actions, including strengthening cross-border surveillance and early warning systems, harmonising public health measures at official and unofficial points of entry, improving laboratory and diagnostic capacity, and reinforcing infection prevention and control measures.
UNICEF Regional Director Ms Etleva Kadilli highlighted the importance of protecting essential services, including education, routine healthcare and social support systems. “Maintaining essential services – health, nutrition and protection, especially for children, girls and women – is going to be paramount,” she said.
Partners highlighted the disproportionate impact of the outbreak on women and frontline caregivers. Representing the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), Regional Director Ms Lydia Zigomo said women accounted for most of the infections recorded so far.
“Women actually are representing more than 60% of the infections in this outbreak,” she said. “Mainly that’s because they’re frontline responders. At the home level, they’re the ones nursing sick people.”
Leaders further called for accelerated research and development for vaccines and therapeutics targeting the Bundibugyo strain, while urging countries and partners to strengthen community engagement, risk communication, laboratory systems and preparedness capacities across at-risk border districts.
While partners’ needs were being consolidated under a joint plan and budget, estimates were that about US$264 million could be required for response operations in the DRC and Uganda, with an additional US$54 million needed to strengthen preparedness across neighbouring high-risk countries, including South Sudan. But Dr Kaseya said the figures remained preliminary.
Distributed by APO Group on behalf of Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC).
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