The World Health Organization (WHO) confirmed that the death toll from the Ebola outbreak in Uganda now stands at 29, including four health workers.
The disease has been ravaging the center of the country for two weeks and the recently produced vaccines for this virus do not work against the strain circulating in that African nation (the less common Sudan strain).
"Sixty-three confirmed and probable cases were reported, including 29 deaths. Ten health workers have been infected and four have died," WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said at a news conference, according to news agencies. AFP and Telam.
"The vaccines used successfully to stop the recent Ebola epidemics in the Democratic Republic of the Congo are not effective against the type of Ebola virus responsible for this epidemic," Tedros warned.
The WHO allocated two million dollars from its reserve fund for emergency situations and is working with its partners to help local authorities strengthen the response to the outbreak, sending specialists and medical supplies.
According to the agency, the Sudanese Ebola strain (last present in Uganda in 2012) is less transmissible and has shown a lower mortality rate in previous outbreaks than the Zaire Ebola, a strain that killed almost 2,300 people in the 2018 to 2020 epidemic in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
The last outbreak that had hit Uganda was also due to Ebola Zaire, which had precisely been imported by the neighboring Democratic Republic of the Congo.
