The Ebola outbreak must be declared an international emergency

The decision would come a few days after the spread of the virus across international borders for the first time. For ten months, the Ebola virus was confined in two provinces of the Democratic Republic of Congo. But this week, at least two cases have appeared in neighboring Uganda.

This statement would only be the fifth time WHO has described an emergency viral public health epidemic of international concern. Previously, WHO had used this statement to highlight the spread of swine flu in 2009, polio and Ebola in 2014 and Zika virus in 2016.

The epidemic has already infected 2,108 people in Congo, said Thursday the Ministry of Health. According to experts, about 411 people died, but this number is probably lower than the actual number of victims.

There were some reasons to hope in recent days as the number of Ebola cases discovered each day has decreased. On Thursday, the Congolese Ministry of Health announced that it had identified 24 new cases, one of the worst days of the epidemic. Six people died, including three who did not seek treatment – a worrying sign that affected communities are still not seeking treatment for those who are beginning to show symptoms.

The virus spread to Uganda when six family members fled a treatment center near the border and crossed long distances to escape border control. The family sought treatment at a hospital in Uganda, where she was isolated. A five-year-old boy became the first victim of Uganda. Her 50-year-old grandmother has also died.

The remaining members of the family and a nanny were taken to a health center in Congo, where treatment centers are better equipped to take care of patients, the health ministry said. On Friday, there were no more cases identified in Uganda.

But the WHO Emergency Statement aims to catch the world's attention at a time when the sense of urgency at the international level has faded.

Donor countries and non-profit groups have already contributed or promised tens of millions of dollars to the response. WHO alone has more than 700 people in the provinces of North Kivu and Ituri, the two regions that have been most affected by the epidemic. Groups like UNICEF and the Red Cross / Red Crescent have hundreds of additional people on the ground.

But the widespread violence against health workers has caused problems and delays that have allowed the virus to spread. Doctors Without Borders has removed its staff from the most affected areas after several attacks on medical facilities. An epidemiologist from the World Health Organization was killed during an attack on an establishment in Butembo town in April.

The security situation has delayed the US intervention. Stakeholders at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and USAID limited themselves to preparing neighboring countries and organizing the response to Goma and Kinshasa after the State Department decided that the region was too risky for security.

Neighboring countries have prepared for the possibility that the virus will cross borders in a region where the population is highly mobile and where more than one million people are displaced from their homes because of decades of ethnic conflict.

Thousands of medical staff in Uganda, Rwanda and South Sudan have already received a vaccine to protect themselves and border guards have controlled more than 65 million people crossing 80 entry points and health checkpoints operational.

CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story erroneously asserted that the epidemic had already been declared an international emergency due to a verification error.