Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has confirmed extra funding to combat an outbreak in Uganda
World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has announced the allocation of an additional $2 million to strengthen Uganda’s response to an ongoing Ebola outbreak.
The move follows the allocation of $1 million in January, bringing the total support to $3 million within the past three weeks. It also comes two days after Uganda’s Health Ministry reported six new cases of the virus, as the country struggles to contain the outbreak first declared on January 30.
“To further support Uganda’s response to the Ebola outbreak, I am releasing an additional $2 million from the WHO Contingency Fund for Emergencies. Our teams are supporting surveillance, laboratories, logistics, infection prevention and control in hospitals, treatment centres and research,” Ghebreyesus wrote in a post on X on Thursday.
Uganda declared an Ebola outbreak on January 30 after a 32-year-old male nurse at Mulago National Referral Hospital died after experiencing multiple-organ failure. As of February 10, the Ugandan Health Ministry has reported nine confirmed cases, including one death. At least 265 contacts of the initial case are currently under monitoring.
“Unfortunately, the first case, also known as the index case, succumbed to the disease. The remaining eight confirmed cases are currently receiving medical care and are in stable condition,” Dr Charles Olaro, director general of health services at the ministry, said in a statement.
In response to the outbreak, the Ugandan Health Ministry, in collaboration with the WHO and other partners, launched a clinical trial for a vaccine against the Sudan Ebola Virus Disease (SUDV) on February 3.
Ebola is a hemorrhagic fever transmitted through contact with infected bodily fluids and tissues. Symptoms include fever, fatigue, muscle pain, headache, sore throat, vomiting, diarrhea, rash, and internal or external bleeding. According to the WHO, the Sudan variant of the disease is severe and kills at least 40% of infected persons.
The latest outbreak marks Uganda’s sixth SUDV incident, with the recent death being the country’s first confirmed Ebola fatality since 2023. Uganda’s last major epidemic occurred in September 2022 in Mubende district and was officially declared over after four months.
Russia’s human welfare watchdog, Rospotrebnadzor, announced on January 31 that it had informed Kampala of its willingness to assist with an epidemiological investigation and anti-epidemic measures against the disease. Russia delivered a mobile laboratory to the landlocked country to allow for rapid laboratory diagnosis of dangerous infectious illnesses last year.
