More than 2,000 people have died from Ebola in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) since the outbreak was declared less than three months ago, according to official government data. At least 1,000 of these deaths occurred in the last three weeks, signaling an alarming acceleration of the virus's spread.

As of Tuesday, a total of 4,381 Ebola cases have been confirmed across five provinces in the DRC, including 2,011 fatalities. This makes it the fastest-growing outbreak on record in the Central African nation and the second-largest globally, surpassed only by the West African epidemic of 2014-2016, which claimed 11,310 lives.

The response to the outbreak has been hampered by multiple challenges, including strikes by unpaid health workers, widespread misinformation, and cultural practices that involve intimate family burials of Ebola victims, potentially heightening transmission risks.

Currently, there is no approved treatment or vaccine for the rare Bundibugyo strain responsible for the DRC's outbreak. The World Health Organization (WHO) announced last week that vaccine trials have commenced, but results are not expected for several months.

On Monday, the WHO revealed that the virus likely emerged in February, three months before the official declaration on May 15, which also affected neighboring Uganda. Meanwhile, Israel's Health Ministry reported a suspected Ebola case in a citizen returning from the DRC, who is now in isolation pending test results within 24 hours.

Source: www.aljazeera.com