The US announced yesterday, Monday, that it was stepping up health controls at the country’s borders against the Ebola virus, which has infected a US citizen in the Democratic Republic of Congo, where an outbreak has broken out.

Washington will implement health controls for travelers arriving in the US by air from African countries affected by the outbreak and has temporarily restricted visas for foreigners who have traveled to those areas, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said.

Washington will implement health controls for travelers arriving in the US by air from African countries affected by the outbreak, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said.

These announcements came after the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the Ebola outbreak in DR Congo an international health emergency.

Over the weekend, the CDC had indicated that they were working “to repatriate safely a small number of Americans directly affected by this outbreak.”

One US citizen was infected with the virus “while working in DR Congo”, the CDC said yesterday.

The CDC said yesterday.

According to the BBC, it is a doctor who was infected with the Ebola virus while caring for patients at a hospital in Bunia, the capital of Ituri province, which is considered the epidemic’s epicentre. The American has been working there since 2023.

He showed “symptoms over the weekend and tested positive late Sunday,” noted Satis Pillay in charge of Ebola management at the CDC, adding that procedures have been initiated to transfer him to Germany to receive medical treatment there.

“At this time, CDC assesses that the immediate risk to the general public in the United States is low, but we will continue to assess the situation as it evolves and may modify public health measures based on new information,” they said in the statement.

In addition to the screenings that will be conducted at airports, the CDC announced restrictions on entry into the US for foreigners who have traveled to Uganda, DR Congo or South Sudan in the past 21 days.

The US Embassy in Kampala announced the temporary suspension of its visa service.

US President Donald Trump said he was “concerned” about the Ebola outbreak when asked about it yesterday. “I think right now it’s confined to Africa, but it’s something that’s on the rise,” he commented.

WHO withdrawal

Neither a vaccine nor a cure exists for the strain of Ebola virus responsible for the current outbreak.

According to the latest figures released Sunday by DR Congo authorities, 91 deaths have been recorded so far allegedly linked to the epidemic, while there are about 350 suspected cases. These have been mainly identified in the Ituri and North Kivu provinces of DR Congo, while two deaths have been reported in neighbouring Uganda.

The Bundibugyo strain of the Ebola virus responsible for the current outbreak was probably spreading for weeks before it was detected, health officials estimate.

According to Matthew Kavanaugh of the Center for Global Health Policy and Politics at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., “because the initial tests were looking for the wrong strain of Ebola, we had a lot of negatives,” resulting in many weeks where there was no appropriate health response. “We’re trying to make up for lost time with a very dangerous pathogen.”

Meanwhile, the US since Trump’s return to the presidency has formally withdrawn from the WHO and curtailed its overseas humanitarian aid funding through USAID, which had played a major role in previous Ebola outbreaks.

CDC assures that they are working with their international partners and health authorities in Ebola-affected countries. The measures they announced yesterday include “deploying CDC staff to support efforts to control the outbreak in affected areas” and help with testing and contact tracing.

For its part, the State Department said it had released $13 million for “immediate response” operations.

However, Kavanaugh called the US response “disappointing”. According to him, border controls are “more theatre than effective public health measures”.

At the same time, Kavanaugh commented that Washington has in the past responded directly to Ebola outbreaks by coordinating the actions of the CDC, USAID and non-governmental organizations.

“The Trump administration claimed that it could negotiate bilateral agreements to bypass the WHO. This outbreak proves that strategy is not working,” he said.