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By Ben Farmer
Hundreds of suspected or confirmed Ebola patients fled from their hospital after Islamic State-linked militants attacked a town in eastern Congo.
At least 30 people were shot or hacked to death during the attack by the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) in an area considered a recent hotspot for the outbreak.
The panicked exodus has raised fears that the upheaval will increase the spread of the deadly haemorrhagic fever.
The town targeted, Cantine-Aloya, is in North Kivu province, which has recently become a front line for efforts to curb the epidemic.
The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is dealing with its 17th and worst-ever outbreak of the Ebola virus.
The current outbreak was declared in mid-May and is already the second worst the world has ever recorded.
Cases began in Ituri province, but the outbreak has since spread to several other provinces, with North Kivu now among the most badly affected.
Medics have confirmed around 10,000 cases in the past six months, and around half of those infected have died.
Local officials said the ADF attack took place shortly before midnight, around 30 miles west of Beni, on 5 November.
The sound of gunfire prompted panic among patients at nearby Kelele hospital, Radio Okapi, a UN-backed station, reported.
Dr Christian Kakule Vulembera, the medical director, said: “Around midnight, the hospital emptied of its patients.
“All the patients left, including those who were in isolation for suspected Ebola virus infection.”
Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC), the public health body of the African Union, said the massacre had come at a critical time in the Ebola response.
The body said in a statement: “Health facilities have been attacked and patients, including hundreds people with confirmed or suspected Ebola infection, have fled in search of safety raising serious public health concerns.”
There is no approved vaccine for the Bundibugyo Ebola strain causing the outbreak.
Efforts to stop the spread rely on isolating those who have, or may have, the infection and tracking down anyone they may have come into contact with.
Health workers had already struggled to trace those potentially exposed to the virus, and the chaos following the attack will have added to their difficulties.
Africa CDC said: “In an Ebola outbreak, every interruption to patient care, contact tracing and disease surveillance creates additional risks for communities already facing extraordinary hardship.
“People must be able to seek treatment safely, and health workers must be able to deliver essential services without fear of violence.”
Decades of civil strife and a wealth of minerals mean eastern DRC is home to as many as 120 different armed militia groups.
The ADF is considered one of the most brutal. The group originated in Uganda but has spent most of its existence in the DRC and swore allegiance to Islamic State in late 2018.
The militia is notorious for killing civilians during raids in the Ituri and North Kivu regions.
When the US State Department designated the ADF a terrorist group in 2021, it said the militia had “been notorious in this region for its brutal violence against Congolese citizens and regional military forces, with attacks killing over 849 civilians in 2020 alone”.
