Every day, Gédéon Banga Ngbape, a community health worker and the head of contact tracing in Nizi, leads his team across regions in eastern Congo. Their mission is to identify individuals who might have interacted with the country’s fastest-expanding Ebola outbreak in history.
One significant issue they face is that health workers haven’t received their salaries in over three months, according to Gédéon Banga Ngbape.
He also highlighted challenges related to the limited mobility of their field staff.
Recently, on Thursday, health workers at the Nizi Treatment Center went on strike, resulting in its temporary closure.
These workers investigate numerous alerts, track those exposed to suspected or confirmed cases, and strive to provide care for anyone displaying symptoms before the virus spreads further.
However, the surveillance system has increasingly struggled to keep up with the spread of the virus.
Ngbape stressed that ineffective surveillance undermines the entire response effort.
Government data released early Tuesday revealed the outbreak has resulted in 4,381 confirmed cases, including 2,011 deaths. The death toll reached almost three times faster than during the 2014-16 Ebola outbreak in West Africa, which was the worst on record.
Though the current outbreak was officially declared on May 15, health authorities now state that sequencing indicates it actually began months earlier, in February.
In Nizi, Ngbape’s teams handle an average of 60 to 70 alerts daily.
Ana Ndroy Kasime, a community health worker in Nizi, visits homes to educate residents about Ebola and reports suspected cases to health officials. Yet, she noted that workers often lack basic protective supplies.
This outbreak, caused by the rare Bundibugyo Ebola virus, is occurring under highly challenging conditions.
Currently, no approved vaccines or treatments exist for the Bundibugyo virus, although trials are ongoing.
The response efforts have been severely hampered by strikes from unpaid health workers, threats from rebel groups, distrust from traumatized communities, and misinformation suggesting that Ebola isn’t real.
