Maeve Cullinan Global Health Security Reporter

Three major laboratories in the Democratic Republic of Congo have run out of Ebola testing kits as infections continue to mount, the World Health Organization has said. 

Case numbers of the Bundibugyo species of Ebola have jumped by more than 200 in under a week, from 380 confirmed cases last Friday to 598 on Wednesday. So far, 101 people have died. 

The rapid increase in confirmed infections is due partly to a scale-up in testing. Teams are working through a large backlog of samples from suspected Ebola patients, many of which were collected several weeks ago, to confirm or rule out the presence of the virus. 

But the WHO has now warned that three laboratories in South and North Kivu, two out of the three provinces in the DRC that have so far recorded cases, have run out of testing supplies.

In a situation report released earlier this week, the global health agency said the labs in major cities including Bukavu and Goma were awaiting the arrival of reagents – substances ​required to run the tests – to resume work on the backlog of samples. 

“Running out of Ebola testing reagents during an active outbreak is a serious setback,” Dr Krutika Kuppalli, associate professor in the division of infectious diseases at the University of Texas Southwestern and former WHO officer, told The Telegraph.

“Diagnostics are the foundation of outbreak control; if cases cannot be rapidly confirmed, this may lead to delays in isolation, treatment, and contact tracing which can allow transmission to continue unchecked,” said Dr Kuppalli.

A halt in testing is a significant risk because it can result in a delay in isolating infected patients and contact tracing, which can allow the virus to spread further through the community, experts say. These measures are all the more crucial because there are currently no other methods to fight the outbreak. 

The Bundibugyo species of Ebola, which is relatively rare, has no approved vaccines or treatments. 

Several pharmaceutical companies, including Moderna and the Serum Institute in India, have entered the race to produce effective immunisations. 

Gavi, the international organisation that supports vaccine production and distribution in the Global South, announced earlier this month that it would pledge $50 million to Bundibugyo vaccine development to speed up manufacturing once the jabs had moved through the clinical trial process. 

Cepi, which funds research into vaccines, also announced it would award $1.9 million to a fourth candidate being developed by Public Health Vaccines, a private biotech company based in Massachusetts. 

But experts have warned it could be months before any new shot is ready to deploy. 

The 2014-2016 West Africa Ebola outbreak, which killed more than 11,000 people, was eventually brought to an end after a new vaccine was deployed in affected countries in a “ring-strategy”, where contacts of people infected were immunised. 

Although the case fatality rate (CFR) may change as the outbreak evolves, it currently sits at 19.2 per cent. This is significantly lower than the CFR for the Zaire species of Ebola, the more common type, which kills 50 per cent of the people it infects on average – but is much higher than that of Covid-19, which is 0.8 per cent. 

Dr Hans Kluge, the WHO’s regional director for Europe, said in a statement on Thursday that the risk of Ebola spreading during the Football World Cup – which is taking place in the US, Canada, and Mexico – “remains low”.

“Many fans from Europe will be travelling to attend. Let me reassure you: none of the host countries, nor the European Region, currently has Ebola cases. There is no reason to change your plans,” said Dr Kluge. 

He added that if anyone developed Ebola symptoms such as fever, aches, and vomiting and had recently travelled to the DRC or neighbouring Uganda, they should “seek medical care”.

On Thursday, the head of Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, Dr Jean Kaseya, called on African countries to implement stronger exit screening at airports. 

The UK has allocated over $26 million (£19,460) in funding for the WHO, UN, and other organisations working to contain the Ebola outbreak in Central Africa. 

In a statement at the UN Security Council earlier this week, UK Deputy Representative to the UN, Archie Young, said: “The UK is deeply concerned about the Ebola outbreak in eastern DRC and neighbouring countries. 

“The conflict in eastern DRC makes the Ebola response harder. We urge all parties and the international community to work together to curb the outbreak.”

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