BUNIA, Congo (AP) — Angry residents of a town at the epicenter of the Ebola outbreak in eastern Congo attacked and burned a tent that was part of a health center where people are being treated for the virus, staff there said Saturday. This was the second such attack in the region in a week.
No one was injured in the attack, according to initial reports, but as patients ran to escape the fire, 18 people with suspected Ebola infections fled the facility and are now missing, a local hospital director said.
Angry residents had arrived at the clinic in the town of Mongbwalu on Friday night and set fire to a tent set up for suspected and confirmed Ebola cases by the humanitarian group Doctors Without Borders, Dr. Richard Lokudi, Director of Mongbwalu Hospital.
“We strongly condemn this act, as it caused panic among the staff and also resulted in the escape of 18 suspected cases into the community,” he said.
On Thursday, another treatment centre, in the town of Rwampara, was burnt down after family members were prevented from taking the body of a local man suspected to have died of Ebola.
Burials of Ebola victims stir anger, frustration
The bodies of those who died of Ebola can be highly contagious and lead to further spread when people prepare them for burial and gather for funerals. The dangerous work of burying suspected victims is being managed wherever possible by the authorities, which could face protests from families and friends.
A communal burial for Ebola patients in Rwampara took place on Saturday under tight security as tensions rose between health workers and the local community, said David Basima, a Red Cross team leader overseeing the burials.
Armed soldiers and police monitored the burials as Red Cross workers in white protective suits lowered closed coffins into the ground. The weeping family members stood at a distance.
Basima said his team, after arriving at the scene, “experienced many difficulties, including resistance from the youth and the community”.
“We had to call the authorities to come to our aid, just for safety,” Basima said.
Authorities in northeastern Congo on Friday banned funeral wakes and gatherings of more than 50 people in a bid to curb the spread of the virus.
The outbreak is a high risk for Congo, WHO says
The World Health Organization has said the outbreak now poses a “very high” risk to Congo – up from a previous categorization of “high” – but that the risk of the disease spreading globally remains low.
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Friday that 82 cases and seven deaths had been confirmed in Congo, but that the outbreak was believed to be “much larger”.
There is no vaccine available for the Bundibugyo virus, a rare strain of Ebola that spread undetected for weeks in Congo’s Ituri province after the first known death, while authorities tested for another, more common Ebola virus and came back negative. There are now 750 suspected cases and 177 suspected deaths, although more are expected as surveillance expands. Dr. Jean Kaseya, director general of the African Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said a response to the outbreak must include building trust with communities.
The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies said on Saturday that three of its volunteers had died in the blast in Mongbwalu. The agency said it believed the three health care workers contracted the virus on March 27 while handling corpses as part of a humanitarian mission unrelated to Ebola.
If confirmed, this would significantly push back the timeline of the outbreak from the first previous confirmed death in late April in the town of Bunia, Ituri’s capital.
US bans green card holders from Ebola-hit countries
Federal U.S. health officials said Friday night they are barring green card holders who have been to Ebola-affected countries from returning to the U.S.
Green card holders are people who are not US citizens but have been granted authorization to live and work permanently in the United States.
According to a Federal Register announcement on Friday, the US government is adopting a rule restricting green card holders who have recently been to Congo, Uganda or South Sudan from re-entering the United States.
It is unclear why South Sudan was on the list as the country has not confirmed any cases of Ebola so far in this outbreak. Such a ban will help ensure that Ebola screening, contact tracing, quarantine monitoring and medical monitoring will be available to US citizens, according to the release.
Federal law provides for a period before such decisions become final, but the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services could argue that the order could take effect immediately under certain circumstances.
The department did not immediately respond to a request for comment. By JUSTIN KABUMBA and WILSON MCMAKIN Associated Press
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