Will this Ebola outbreak be the biggest yet?

DRC and Uganda declared an Ebola outbreak on 15 May after recording 246 suspected cases and 80 suspected deaths. On 18 May, an international modelling study suggested the true number of infections could be vastly higher. WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said he was deeply concerned about the scale and speed of the epidemic. The outbreak involves Bundibugyo virus, which has likely been spreading undetected for weeks, giving it a head start that makes containment difficult. The outbreak’s size and its spread in urban and semi-urban areas in Ituri and North Kivu led WHO to declare a Public Health Emergency of International Concern on 17 May, while stating it does not constitute a pandemic emergency.

"By the time both the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Uganda declared an Ebola outbreak on 15 May, officials said that they had recorded 246 suspected cases and 80 suspected deaths. A few days later, on 18 May, an international research team released the results of a modelling study suggesting that the true number of infections could be vastly higher."

"Those data points are shocking researchers and public-health specialists: the director-general of the World Health Organization (WHO), Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said on 19 May that he is "deeply concerned about the scale and speed of the epidemic". That's because, compared with past outbreaks, these numbers stand out. For example, in March 2014, when Guinea initially declared what would eventually become the largest recorded Ebola epidemic so far, it reported only 49 suspected cases and 29 suspected deaths."

"The virus causing the latest outbreak, a rare species called Bundibugyo virus, has clearly been spreading unidentified for weeks. "The virus has a big head start," so efforts to contain it will face an uphill struggle, said Tom Frieden, former director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, during a 20 May talk organized by news outlet MedPage Today."

"The startling size of the outbreak - along with its occurrence in urban and semi-urban areas in the Ituri and North Kivu provinces of the DRC, where people travel and interact a lot - prompted the WHO to declare the outbreak a Public Health Emergency of International Concern on 17 May. "In light of all these risks, I decided it was urgent to act immediately to prevent more deaths and mobilize an effective and international response," Tedros said at a 20 May briefing. But he said that the outbreak does not constitute a pandemic emergency."

Read at Nature