Confirmed Ebola Cases in DR Congo Surpass 10,000

AP

A health workers checks the temperature of a man in Congo.

The number of confirmed Ebola cases in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DR Congo) has exceeded 10,000, according to government data released on Tuesday.

The latest situation report from the country’s public health institute put the total at 10,060 cases.

Last week, youths armed with machetes attacked two community health workers raising awareness about the outbreak in eastern DR Congo, killing one and injuring the other, according to officials and a memorandum seen by Reuters.

The worker who was killed was an experienced nurse who had worked at the general hospital in the town of Bafwasende in Tshopo province, and was recently tasked with helping to raise awareness about the deadly virus in the local community, where he was a well-known figure, a local official and the memo said.

"We are shocked at how the population turned against this nurse. It is impossible ⁠to believe that ⁠he was mistaken for a stranger," a local health official told Reuters.

The attack took place on Friday afternoon, when the nurse and a colleague, a teacher also working on community outreach, stopped to check on a lot of land. A group of people building a home next door began to accuse them of spreading the disease by contaminating water.

"Here are the people that are spreading the Ebola virus through people's toilets and rivers!" they shouted, according to the ⁠memo shared by a health official.

The angry group was joined by youths wielding machetes and batons, who attacked the pair. The nurse died on the spot before the hospital's emergency services could reach them, the memo said, while the teacher survived.

Source: Reuters



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