More than 4,000 people have died in Congo’s Ebola outbreak, the health ministry said on Friday, as authorities struggle to contain what has become the country’s fastest-growing epidemic.
The ministry’s latest figures showed 4,018 deaths among 8,300 confirmed cases. More than 2,000 patients have recovered.
Congo declared the outbreak on May 15. It is caused by the rare Bundibugyo strain of Ebola, for which there is no known treatment or vaccine.
In Bunia, the capital of northeastern Ituri province and the outbreak’s epicentre, health workers gathered to demand payment of overdue wages. Officials quickly dispersed the protest.
The demonstrators included surveillance workers, who trace people exposed to infected patients. They held placards reading “No money, no data!” and “No payment for months.”
Front-line workers have staged several strikes since the outbreak began, disrupting efforts to contain the disease.
Médecins Sans Frontières, known in English as Doctors Without Borders, said one of its aid workers contracted Ebola while working in Congo. The worker arrived in the Netherlands late Thursday on a special medical flight and was taken to a high-level isolation unit, Leiden University Medical Centre said.
“The human cost of this crisis is unprecedented in the DRC, with communities facing the largest Ebola disease outbreak ever recorded in the country,” MSF said.
More than 50 health workers have died after contracting the virus.
