By Lauren Weber
From the article:
The Democratic Republic of Congo has confirmed its first Ebola death in the eastern city of Butembo, a trade hub with Uganda that is home to almost a million people. This first urban death, combined with ongoing violence in the northeastern outbreak area in DRC and some community resistance, is worrying experts that the slowing outbreak could still escalate.
Having already killed 87 people, this outbreak is close to becoming the eighth-largest Ebola outbreak in history. While officials have been pleased with the decreasing pace of cases and a successful vaccination and contact tracing campaign, this new case in an urban setting is worrisome, Peter Salama, the World Health Organization’s emergency response chief, told HuffPost.
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Jeremy Konyndyk, a senior policy fellow for the Washington-based Center for Global Development who previously led parts of the 2014 Ebola response for the Obama administration, pointed to those potential cases as a major concern.
“We had a phase during 2014 in West Africa where, likewise, case counts were declining and it appeared things had turned a corner. But, in fact, there was significant spread that just wasn’t being seen, and subsequently allowed the later explosion.” More than 11,300 people were killed in the 2014-2016 West Africa outbreak, which cost the world billions and infected 28,600.
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