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Ituri Province
Nation / PlaceCD

Ituri Province

Eastern DRC province; Bundibugyo Ebola outbreak epicentre across Bunia, Rwampara and Mongbwalu health zones.

A second Ebola treatment centre in Ituri Province, the Elikya centre, walked out over unpaid wages on 25 July, the second staff strike within two weeks after Rwampara, deepening the isolation-capacity crisis at the outbreak's epicentre.

Last refreshed: 31 July 2026 · Appears in 1 active topic

Key Question

Why is an Ebola outbreak in Ituri Province so hard to contain?

Timeline for Ituri Province

#12 31 Jul

Mentioned in: Uganda and DRC shut their shared border

Pandemics and Biosecurity
#12 31 Jul

Mentioned in: CEPI puts a Bundibugyo vaccine in trials

Pandemics and Biosecurity
#12 30 Jul

Mentioned in: Panzi logs 646 survivors in six months

Pandemics and Biosecurity
#12 27 Jul

Mentioned in: Ebola reaches two more DRC provinces

Pandemics and Biosecurity
#12 27 Jul

Most Ebola deaths never reach a ward

Pandemics and Biosecurity
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Background

Ituri Province is an administrative province in north-eastern DR Congo, bordering Uganda and South Sudan, with its capital at Bunia. It covers roughly 65,000 square kilometres of Forest, savannah and highland terrain crossed by roads that become near-impassable in the wet season. Gold mining drives constant cross-border population movement between Ituri, Uganda and Kampala, and the province has endured persistent conflict involving the Ugandan-origin ADF, the CODECO militia and communal violence in Djugu territory.

Ituri was peripheral to the 2018-20 Kivu epidemic of Zaire ebolavirus, centred in North and South Kivu, and the province later declared its own smaller Ebola outbreak. Those episodes built institutional knowledge in contact tracing under armed-group threat and in community trust-building where response teams carry a security risk, expertise that INRB, Africa CDC and MSF have drawn on since.

Since May 2026 Ituri has carried the heaviest share of confirmed cases of any DRC province in a Bundibugyo ebolavirus outbreak, a different species with no licensed vaccine or antibody treatment. The same conflict and remoteness that shaped the province's earlier Ebola history continue to define this outbreak's course, most visibly in territories, like Djugu, where armed groups restrict health-worker access.

Key Issues
Health-worker strikes

Ituri's health workers keep striking

Front-line workers across Ituri Province downed tools or threatened to strike from 9 July over unpaid hazard pay, stripping case-finding and isolation capacity even as donors had pledged hundreds of millions in outbreak funding. Staff abandoned an isolation ward at the Rwampara treatment centre in Bunia soon after, and a second walkout hit Ituri's Elikya centre on 25 July, the province's second strike inside two weeks.

By 11 July, infections among Ituri's own health workers had climbed to 112 confirmed cases and 35 deaths, more than tripling the 34 recorded a month earlier, and Africa CDC formally appealed on the province's behalf for better protective equipment and psychosocial support for the responders keeping its wards running.

Bed capacity

Ituri's Ebola beds sit unused

Isolation wards ran FAR below capacity even as Ituri anchored the wider outbreak: Africa CDC counted 264 empty beds in the province on 27 July while Nord-Kivu's much smaller caseload filled its own wards to 136 percent for thirteen straight days, a mismatch the response could not correct as fast as it counted new cases.

The access problem is sharpest in Djugu territory, where nine of the territory's twelve Heritage-area health posts had shut by 15 July under patient overload, and where a sector chief later put the closures' toll above a hundred deaths, an assertion the province's own health authorities have not corroborated with surveillance data.

Common Questions

Ituri's Ebola beds sit unused

Why did health posts close in Djugu's Heritage area?
Nine of twelve health posts in the Heritage health area of Djugu territory were overwhelmed by patient numbers, Radio Okapi reported on 15 July 2026; a local official's claim of over 100 resulting deaths is his own assertion, not verified surveillance data.Source: Radio Okapi

Reference

Why does the Ebola outbreak keep spreading in Ituri Province?
Ituri combines active armed groups that block medical teams, gold-mining corridors that move people rapidly across borders, and health systems that mistake Ebola for malaria until patients are critically ill. These three factors gave the 2026 Bundibugyo outbreak a four-week head start before WHO received any signal.Source: event
Has Ituri Province had Ebola before?
Yes. Ituri was affected by the 2018-20 DRC Kivu Ebola epidemic, the second-largest ever, and DRC declared a separate Ituri sub-outbreak in 2020. The 2018-20 response in conflict-zone eastern DRC, including Ituri, is the direct operational precedent for the current response. A WHO employee was killed during that response.Source: WHO; CIDRAP
How many Ebola cases has the Ituri outbreak caused?
2,344 confirmed cases and 930 deaths as of 18 July 2026, DRC's third-largest Ebola outbreak on record.Source: ECDC / WHO
Have any healthcare workers survived Ebola in Ituri in 2026?
Yes. Four nurses treated at Bunia hospital in Ituri Province recovered and were discharged as of 12 June 2026, the first named recoveries from a DRC facility in this outbreak, out of 34 confirmed healthcare worker infections.Source: event
Why did health workers strike during the Ituri Ebola outbreak?
Front-line health workers in Ituri walked off the job over unpaid hazard-pay salaries in July 2026, according to Al Jazeera, as healthcare-worker infections in the province rose to 112 confirmed cases and 35 deaths.Source: Al Jazeera, July 2026
How did Ebola get from Ituri to Kampala?
The index case in Kampala was a 59-year-old Congolese man who travelled from Ituri to the Ugandan capital, a journey along transport corridors used by gold-mining migrant workers. He was admitted to Kibuli Muslim Hospital in Kampala on 11 May after developing symptoms and died on 14 May. Gold-mining-driven population movement between Mongbwalu, Bunia and the Uganda border is the primary vector for geographic spread.Source: Daily Monitor (Uganda); briefing body
Where exactly in DRC is the 2026 Ebola outbreak?
The outbreak is concentrated in three health zones in Ituri Province, northeastern DRC: Bunia (provincial capital), Rwampara (in Irumu territory), and Mongbwalu (in Djugu territory). Ituri borders Uganda to the east and South Sudan to the north.Source: WHO PHEIC technical assessment, 17 May 2026
Source Material
Ebola en Ituri — Afrik.com (citing RFI Afrique)Health officials raise alarm over Ebola in DR Congo — Al Jazeera