NEW YORK, SEPTEMBER 7, 2018—In its first month of responding to the Ebola outbreak in North Kivu, Democratic Republic of Congo, the international medical humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) has treated 65 people with the virus—more than 80 percent of the total number of confirmed patients hospitalized in the region’s Ebola Treatment Centers so far. Of the patients confirmed positive in MSF’s Mangina Ebola Treatment Center, 29 have recovered and returned to their families while three people remain in treatment.
“We are at a crucial point in the epidemic,” said Berangère Guais, MSF’s emergency coordinator in Beni. “Yes, the number of patients in the treatment center has reduced significantly, but new cases from a number of different chains of transmission have emerged in recent days. We must continue to work with the community to build trust and ensure that everyone presenting with symptoms of the Ebola is isolated and tested quickly. We just cannot let down our guard until the epidemic is declared over.”
On the eve of the August 1 declaration of North Kivu’s first Ebola epidemic, MSF teams working in a hospital in Lubero arrived in Mangina, the epicenter of the outbreak. They immediately began working alongside the Congolese Ministry of Health to mount a response against the outbreak. In the days that followed, experienced MSF staff arrived from across DRC and around the world to help train local staff and work with them to care for the sick and curb the spread of the outbreak.