<
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/may/21/ebola-outbreak-public-health>
"A previously undetected outbreak of Ebola is coursing through parts of central
Africa, and the US appears to be doing little to help stop it, after massive
cuts to global and domestic public health efforts.
There is no cure and no vaccine for the rare Bundibugyo variant of Ebola, which
has caused two outbreaks in recent decades. Health leaders and scientists are
now racing to understand where the virus is spreading and attempting to stop it
– but the US is notably absent in these efforts.
In the past year, the US Agency for International Development (USAID) has been
dismantled, thousands of staff at US health agencies were laid off,
communications stalled and key scientific research canceled.
There are 482 suspected cases and about 116 deaths reported since April in the
Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), with two cases and one death in Uganda
and potential spread to neighboring South Sudan. The outbreak “might have been
going on for a few months”, said Kristian Andersen, a professor of immunology
and microbiology at Scripps Research.
The outbreak was immediately declared a public health emergency of
international concern (PHEIC) by Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director
general of the World Health Organization (WHO), before even convening the
committee that usually makes that determination. Officials say it may last for
months.
“The DRC is one of the most vulnerable health systems in the world, and was the
second-biggest recipient of USAID funding,” said Matthew Kavanagh, director of
the Center for Global Health Policy and Politics at Georgetown University. The
US withdrawal of funding with “zero notice” has been “disruptive to the
country’s basic activities”, he said.
US foreign assistance to the DRC dropped from $1.4bn in 2024 to $431m in 2025
and only $21m so far this year. Assistance to Uganda dropped from $674m to
$377m in 2025 and a negative $1.2m so far in 2026.
“It was pennies compared to what you get in return,” Andersen said of global
health investments. It is far cheaper and easier to prevent and contain
outbreaks than it is to respond to them, he said. With the US cutting off the
first option, the second scenario will become increasingly common.
The US also announced it would leave the WHO and end $130m in funding, which
resulted in 2,371 lost jobs at the organization, Kavanagh said, calling the
cuts a “self-inflicted wound that the administration has really brought on us”.
This outbreak and response was “deeply foreseeable when you gut public health
surveillance and you gut public health capacity”, Kavanagh added.
“It’s not just that we’re leaving the table, we are completely cutting
ourselves out of the conversation,” Andersen said. “We are upending the
table.”"
Via Violet Blue’s
Threat Model - Ebola - Hantavirus - Covid: May 21, 2026
https://www.patreon.com/posts/ebola-hantavirus-158834285
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
