Ebola in DRC: 5,372 deaths and a 51.6% fatality rate, according to the national research institute

The Ebola epidemic in the Democratic Republic of Congo has crossed a new threshold: 5,372 deaths as of Friday, October 30, 2026, according to the latest official report published on Sunday, November 1, 2026, and reported by Africanews. The fatality rate has reached 51.6%: more than one in two confirmed patients does not survive.

The figures come from the situation report by the National Institute of Biomedical Research (INRB), which recorded 10,414 confirmed cases as of October 30, 2026. The sharp increase in the number of deaths recorded in this report does not correspond to a single-day outbreak; it is the result of a retrospective data readjustment between the local collection team and the epidemic management team in Ituri province, Africanews clarifies.

A strain without a vaccine or treatment

The strain involved is the Bundibugyo strain, for which there is neither an approved vaccine nor a treatment, Africanews and Al Jazeera recall. Healthcare workers manage patients based on their symptoms. This is the decisive difference from recent outbreaks of the Zaire strain, where a vaccine had helped protect contacts. The epidemic was declared in mid-May 2026 and has spread to eight of the country's twenty-six provinces, according to Al Jazeera, which describes it as the deadliest ever recorded in the DRC and the second in the world after the 2014-2016 outbreak in West Africa.

The figure that worries epidemiologists

One indicator summarizes the current difficulty: approximately 80% of new cases appear outside the chain of tracked contacts, according to Africa CDC as cited by Africanews. In other words, the disease is circulating widely outside the perimeter that health teams are monitoring, which makes anticipation almost impossible and exposes frontline healthcare workers.

Cases have also been reported in Uganda, Kenya, and Nigeria. Saudi Arabia suspended travel to Kenya and entries from that country on Friday, October 30, 2026, according to the Saudi Press Agency as cited by Al Jazeera.

This toll raises a question of health justice that the continent knows well: prevention tools exist for one strain of Ebola but not for the one currently striking Ituri. It is Congolese researchers and healthcare workers who are documenting and facing this epidemic, declared more than five months ago, with the resources they have available.