By Jean-Yves Kamale and Olivia Le Poidevin
Kinshasa, DRC: An unknown illness has killed more than 50 people in the north-west of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, according to doctors on the ground and the World Health Organisation.
The interval between the onset of symptoms and death has been 48 hours in the majority of cases, and “that’s what’s really worrying,” Serge Ngalebato, medical director of Bikoro Hospital, a regional monitoring centre, told the Associated Press.
The outbreak began on January 21, and 419 cases have been recorded, including 53 deaths.
Prime Minister of the Democratic Republic of Congo Judith Suminwa talks to journalists at a press conference in Geneva.Credit: AP
According to the WHO’s Africa office, the first outbreak in the town of Boloko began after three children ate a bat and died within 48 hours following haemorrhagic fever symptoms.
There have long been concerns about diseases jumping from animals to humans in places where wild animals are popularly eaten. The number of such outbreaks in Africa has surged by more than 60 per cent in the last decade, the WHO said in 2022.
After the second outbreak of the current mystery disease began in the town of Bomate on February 9, samples from 13 cases were sent to the National Institute for Biomedical Research in Congo’s capital, Kinshasa, for testing, the WHO said.
All samples have been negative for Ebola or other common haemorrhagic fever diseases such as Marburg. Some tested positive for malaria.
Last year, another mystery flulike illness that killed dozens of people in another part of Congo was determined to be likely malaria.
Meanwhile, fighting in eastern Congo has killed some 7000 since January, Prime Minister Judith Suminwa told a high-level meeting of the Human Rights Council in Geneva on Monday, with combatants and civilians among the dead.
About 3000 deaths were reported in Goma, Suminwa said, and about 450,0000 people were left without shelter after 90 displacement camps were destroyed.
Since January, the M23 rebel group, which Kinshasa accuses Rwanda of backing, has captured swaths of eastern Congo including the cities of Goma and Bukavu, and valuable mineral deposits.
M23 rebels guard a unit of surrendering Congolese police officers who will be recruited into the rebel group, in Bukavu, Democratic Republic of Congo, at the weekend.Credit: Getty Images
The latest fighting, and M23’s advance, are part of a major escalation in eastern Congo of a conflict over power, identity and resources dating back to the Rwandan genocide in the 1990s.
Rwanda rejects allegations from Congo, the United Nations and Western powers that it supports M23 rebels with arms and troops.
Suminwa urged the world to act and to impose “dissuasive sanctions” on Rwanda amid mass displacements and summary executions.
“It is impossible to describe the screams and cries of millions of victims of this conflict,” she said.
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, at the Geneva meeting, said human rights around the world were being “suffocated” and made reference to horrifying abuses in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
“If this question of the violation of territorial integrity isn’t resolved, the situation could degenerate,” Suminwa told Reuters in a press briefing after her address to the council.
About 40,000 people have fled to Burundi, one of the nine countries that borders the Democratic Republic of the Congo, in two weeks to escape the fighting, the UN said on Friday.
Suminwa warned that the worsening security situation with M23 and other armed groups could spill over to neighbouring countries, posing a danger to them.
AP
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