DRC: more than 50 people killed by an unknown disease

A mysterious disease has killed more than 50 people in the northwest of the Democratic Republic of Congo in less than a month, lamented the World Health Organization (WHO).

“419 cases have been recorded, including 53 deaths, since January 21,” according to reports.

The first cases were recorded in the town of Boloko, according to the WHO Africa office, after three children, suffering from symptoms of haemorrhagic fever, ate a bat and died within 48 hours.

After the start of the second outbreak of the mysterious disease in the town of Bomate on February 9, samples from 13 cases were sent to the National Institute for Biomedical Research in Kinshasa, the capital of the DRC, for testing, WHO said.

All samples tested negative for Ebola or other common hemorrhagic diseases such as Marburg virus. Some tested positive for malaria.

What is really worrying is the interval between the onset of symptoms and death, which is 48 hours in the majority of cases, Serge Ngalebato, Medical Director of Bikoro Hospital, a regional surveillance center, said.

There has long been concern about diseases passing from animals to humans in regions where the consumption of wild animals is widespread.

The number of such epidemics in Africa has risen by over 60% in the last decade, WHO reported in 2022.

Last year, another mysterious flu-like illness, which claimed the lives of dozens of people in another part of the DRC, turned out to be probably malaria.