Ekeomah Atuonwu
The World Health Organization confirmed the death of a second Ebola patient in the northwestern Democratic Republic of the Congo on Tuesday, just days after a new outbreak of the deadly disease emerged.
According to genetic testing, an infection confirmed last week was a new “spillover event,” a transmission from an infected animal, and was unrelated to the previous outbreak, which was declared over in December, the World Health Organization saidon Monday.
According to a WHO spokesperson, the second fatality was a female relative of the first case.
The first patient developed symptoms on April 5, but did not seek medical attention for more than a week.
On April 21, he was admitted to an Ebola treatment center in Mbandaka, the capital of Congo’s Equateur province, and died the next day.
Congo has had 13 previous Ebola outbreaks, including one in the east in 2018-2020 that killed nearly 2,300 people, the second highest toll in the hemorrhagic fever’s history.