The World Health Organization has declared the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Uganda a public health emergency of international concern. WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus made the call on 17 May 2026, after the virus crossed from the DRC into neighbouring Uganda.
That label is WHO's highest level of alarm. It does not mean the world faces a pandemic. WHO stated that the outbreak does not meet the criteria of a pandemic emergency. It does mean the situation needs coordinated international attention before it grows.
This outbreak is caused by the Bundibugyo virus, one of the rarer strains of Ebola.
What is happening in Congo and Uganda
The outbreak began in Ituri Province, in the remote northeast of the DRC near the border with Uganda. As of 16 May 2026, WHO reported eight laboratory-confirmed cases, 246 suspected cases, and 80 suspected deaths across at least three health zones in the province: Bunia, Rwampara, and Mongbwalu.
Those numbers carry real uncertainty. WHO said the true scale is unknown, and several signs point to an outbreak larger than testing has captured. Eight of the first 13 samples collected tested positive. Clusters of community deaths with Ebola-like symptoms have surfaced across several areas. At least four healthcare workers have died in circumstances that suggest viral haemorrhagic fever, which raises concern about transmission inside health facilities.
The virus has already crossed a border. Two people tested positive in Kampala, Uganda's capital, on 15 and 16 May. Both had travelled from the DRC, and the two cases showed no clear link to each other. One of the two patients died. Both received treatment in intensive care. A separate case reported in Kinshasa, the DRC capital, later tested negative on confirmatory testing and does not count as confirmed.
What the Bundibugyo strain is
Ebola is not a single virus. Scientists recognise six species in the Ebola group, and three of them drive most large outbreaks: the Ebola virus, known as the Zaire strain, the Sudan virus, and the Bundibugyo virus behind this event.
Bundibugyo takes its name from a province in western Uganda, where doctors first identified it during an outbreak in 2007 and 2008. It is rare. Its genetic code runs about 30 percent different from the Ebola viruses that usually cause outbreaks, and it copies itself at a slower pace inside the body than the Zaire strain.
This is only the third known Bundibugyo outbreak. The first hit Uganda in 2007 and 2008. The second struck the DRC in 2012. For the DRC, it is the 17th Ebola outbreak since the virus first appeared there in 1976.
How Ebola spreads, and how dangerous it is
Ebola does not travel through the air. According to the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, it spreads through direct contact with the blood or other bodily fluids of an infected person, with contaminated materials, or with the body of someone who has died from the disease. That is why funerals and care settings carry such high risk, and why family members and healthcare workers face the most exposure.
The early symptoms look like many ordinary illnesses: fever, fatigue, muscle pain, headache, and a sore throat. Vomiting, diarrhoea, and abdominal pain come next. Internal and external bleeding can appear as the disease worsens.
Ebola is a serious disease. Across past outbreaks, fatality rates have ranged from 25 to 90 percent, with an average near 50 percent, according to WHO. Médecins Sans Frontières, also known as Doctors Without Borders, estimates the Bundibugyo strain kills 25 to 40 percent of the people it infects. The medical charity is scaling up its work in Ituri and has described the pace of cases and deaths, and the spread across health zones and borders, as a serious concern.
No approved vaccine or treatment exists for the Bundibugyo strain. The better-known Zaire strain has both. Bundibugyo has neither. WHO named that gap as one reason it treated this event as extraordinary.
Why WHO called it an emergency
A public health emergency of international concern is a formal trigger under international health law. It tells governments to prepare, share information, and coordinate a response.
