An angry crowd set fire to Ebola isolation tents at a hospital in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo after relatives and friends of a young man believed to have died from the virus were stopped from taking his body for burial, Ada Derana reported, citing BBC, AFP, AP and Reuters wire copy.
The incident took place at Rwampara General Hospital near Bunia in Ituri province — the epicentre of the current outbreak. “They started throwing projectiles at the hospital. They even set fire to tents that were being used as isolation wards,” local politician Luc Malembe Malembe told the BBC. Police fired warning shots to disperse the crowd, and a healthcare worker was injured by stones before law enforcement intervened. Medical staff were placed under military protection.
Witnesses told Reuters the dead man was a footballer who had played for several local teams. His mother said she believed he had died of typhoid fever, not Ebola. Two tents were burned down, along with a body that had been due for safe burial. Six patients under treatment in the tents were initially feared to have fled but are reported by the medical charity Alima to be accounted for and receiving care at the hospital.
Congolese Foreign Minister Thérèse Kayikwamba Wagner called the situation “very frightening” and said authorities were ramping up community engagement in affected areas.
Body disputes are a recurrent risk during Ebola outbreaks. The World Health Organization recommends “safe and dignified burials” with trained teams using protective equipment, because the bodies of victims remain highly infectious.
Congolese Health Minister Samuel Roger Kamba told state broadcaster RTNC TV that authorities had registered 159 deaths in the outbreak, more than the 139 reported by the WHO earlier in the week in its public health emergency of international concern declaration. The outbreak is caused by the rare Bundibugyo strain of Ebola, for which no approved vaccine yet exists.
Separately, DR Congo’s national football team cancelled its pre-World Cup training camp in Kinshasa because of the outbreak. Two cases have been detected in neighbouring Uganda, prompting authorities there to suspend flights, buses and other public transport across the border, along with passenger ferries on the Semliki River.
The unrest unfolded as DR Congo and the African Union postponed the India-Africa Forum Summit and as fighting earlier this week disrupted access in the rebel-held areas of South Kivu. Sri Lanka has activated a five-point preparedness plan since the WHO declaration.
Source: Ada Derana (Reuters/BBC/AFP/AP).
