WHO says Ebola death toll in DRC and Uganda has surpassed 1,000

The World Health Organization says the death toll in the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda has surpassed 1,000.

In all, 2,473 cases of the deadly virus, including 999 deaths, have been confirmed in the Congo, while 20 cases, including two deaths, have been registered in neighbouring Uganda.

Kinshasa’s health ministry says that at least 737 patients are currently in isolation and hospitals.

The outbreak, caused by the Bundibugyo virus, was declared on 15 May in Ituri Province in the DRC, before spreading to four other regions in the east of the country.

Several cases were then reported in Uganda, linked mostly to Congolese citizens who had crossed the border.

Kampala says it has gone three weeks without registering any new cases.

This rare strain of Ebola, which spreads through close contact and infected bodily fluids, currently has no approved vaccine or specific treatment.

By the time the WHO declared the outbreak a Public Health Emergency of International Concern in May, the virus had already been spreading undetected for weeks.

It warned last week that Ebola had over the past month "expanded faster than any previous outbreak".

This includes the 2013-2016 outbreak that is considered the worst on record with over 11,000 deaths out of at least 28,000 cases.

That outbreak took about eight months to reach 1,000 deaths.

The WHO's incident manager for Bundibugyo virus in DRC, Thierno Balde, earlier this week said that despite a ramping up of the response, "the outbreak remains ahead of us”.

But the WHO has reported "encouraging progress", with trials for two potential treatments, a vaccine and a post-exposure prophylaxis underway on the ground.