The Democratic Republic of Congo is in the grip of the fastest-growing Ebola outbreak ever recorded, with health officials confirming 317 deaths in a single week — one of the deadliest seven-day stretches since the crisis began in May. The overall death toll has now climbed past 2,600, with more than 5,500 confirmed cases across the country's east.

The outbreak was first declared by DRC health authorities on May 15, 2026, with the World Health Organization declaring a public health emergency just two days later. Investigators believe the virus was quietly circulating around the mining town of Mongbwalu as early as February, months before it was formally identified. The epicenter sits in Ituri province and has since spread into neighboring North Kivu.

A Rarer, Deadlier Strain

Unlike most past Ebola outbreaks, this one is being driven by the Bundibugyo ebolavirus species — a rarer strain for which there is currently no approved vaccine or treatment. The overall case-fatality rate stands at 47.9%, but in hard-hit North Kivu it spikes to 68.6%, meaning more than two out of every three confirmed patients there have died.

Public health experts caution the real toll is likely far worse than official counts suggest. An estimated 60% to 70% of deaths are occurring in communities before victims ever reach a treatment facility, leading some researchers to believe the true case count could be up to three times higher than reported. Compared at the same point in their respective timelines, this outbreak has already produced seven times more deaths than the 2014-16 West Africa epidemic — history's deadliest, which killed more than 11,000 people over two years.

WE ARE FED UP WITH RECORDING NEW CASES OF EBOLA EVERY DAY.

That frustration, voiced by Ituri resident Héritier Ramazani as a fresh vaccine shipment arrived last week, captures the exhaustion setting into a region already strained by years of conflict. Armed clashes between Congolese government forces and the M23 militia have repeatedly disrupted the outbreak response — responders say at least a dozen Ebola treatment facilities have come under attack, even as health workers battle chronic underpayment and a flood of misinformation about the virus.

There is a narrow window of hope. On Friday, DRC received a shipment of more than 16,000 doses of the Ervebo vaccine, which has proven effective against other Ebola strains. The World Health Organization is now moving to launch clinical trials testing whether Ervebo also protects against the Bundibugyo strain driving this outbreak — though no timeline has been set for distributing doses to frontline health workers or affected communities.

"Aid workers and communities must do more, and do it today, to save lives and stop Ebola," UN Ebola coordinator Julian Harneis said in a statement, as the UN pushes for expanded contact tracing and stronger security around treatment centers. For now, with cases still climbing and a conflict zone complicating every step of the response, health officials say the outbreak shows no sign of having peaked.