Angry young men stormed Mongbwalu General Hospital in eastern Congo on Sunday evening, forcing medical staff to rush Ebola patients and hospital workers to safety as gunfire erupted nearby. Hospital director Dr. Richard Lokudu said the attackers demanded the release of two bodies of relatives, underscoring the tension surrounding burial practices during the outbreak. It was not immediately clear whether anyone was injured in the assault, but the hospital was placed on high alert as the situation unfolded.
The attack was the third in one week on healthcare facilities treating suspected Ebola patients, highlighting the insecurity and distrust complicating response efforts in northeastern Congo. The World Health Organization has declared the outbreak a public health emergency of international concern, saying the situation poses a “very high” risk to Congo, though the global risk remains low.
Authorities have moved to control burials because bodies of Ebola victims can remain highly contagious and spread the disease during funeral rites. Congolese officials have ordered that suspected Ebola deaths be handled by trained authorities whenever possible, a policy that has triggered anger from some families. On Friday, the government also banned funeral wakes and gatherings of more than 50 people in northeastern Congo to reduce transmission.
The violence follows multiple attacks on Ebola response sites. On Saturday, residents of Mongbwalu, in Ituri province, attacked and set fire to a tent used by Doctors Without Borders for suspected and confirmed Ebola cases. After that assault, 18 people with suspected infections reportedly fled and remained unaccounted for. On Thursday, another treatment center in Rwampara was burned after family members were blocked from retrieving the body of a man suspected of dying from Ebola.
The outbreak is caused by the Bundibugyo virus, a rare Ebola strain for which no vaccine is available. Health officials say it spread undetected for weeks in Ituri after the first reported death in late April in Bunia, the provincial capital, when authorities initially tested for a more common Ebola strain and got a negative result.
The Congolese Ministry of Communication said Sunday that there were 904 suspected Ebola cases, mostly in Ituri province, a sharp increase from the more than 700 cases reported previously. The ministry also said suspected deaths had reached 119, though figures it released by region totaled 220, and officials did not immediately explain the discrepancy.
The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies said three of its volunteers had died in Mongbwalu, believing they were infected after handling dead bodies on March 27 during a humanitarian mission unrelated to Ebola. If confirmed, that timing would significantly alter the known timeline of the outbreak.
The growing number of suspected cases, the death toll, and repeated attacks on treatment sites have raised fears that fear, grief and mistrust could further fuel the spread of the virus.
