Africa CDC's latest situation report puts two-thirds of this outbreak's deaths outside any treatment centre, with 264 beds standing empty in the epicentre while a neighbouring province runs at 134% of capacity. Uganda declared itself Ebola-free on 28 July, thirty days before the surveillance window WHO recorded, and three institutional records disagree about why. US measles has broken the 2025 record, with zero deaths so far.
Bed capacity, lab throughput and unpaid wages, not virus behaviour, are driving Bundibugyo's rising death toll.
Africa CDC placed 683 of 1,033 reported Bundibugyo deaths in the community, outside any treatment or isolation centre. Two fatal cases in three never touch the care system.
Africa CDC's latest report found two in three recorded Ebola deaths, 683 of 1,033, happened at home rather than in care. The case data runs through 27 July.
Most fatal cases never reach a treatment centre at all. Bodies are washed and buried by family at peak infectiousness, so each death is a likely spreading event.
Tshopo and South Kivu logged their first confirmed Bundibugyo cases, taking transmission to 48 of DR Congo's 140 affected-region health zones across five provinces.
Bundibugyo Ebola has now reached 48 of 140 health zones across five DR Congo provinces. Tshopo and South Kivu recorded their first confirmed cases this window.
Tshopo's five cases carry an 80% death rate, but Africa CDC attributes that to a brand new area with no isolation beds yet, not a deadlier virus.
North Kivu ran its isolation wards at 134% of capacity on 27 July. Ituri, carrying nine times as many cases, had 264 beds free.
Nord-Kivu's Ebola isolation wards ran as full as 136% for thirteen straight days, Africa CDC reported. Ituri, the epicentre with far more cases, had 264 empty beds instead.
The beds exist. They are simply in the wrong province, a mismatch the response cannot fix as fast as it counts new cases.
Staff at the Elikya Ebola Treatment Centre struck over unpaid wages on 25 July. Elikya is not Rwampara: this is the second centre lost to payroll failure in twelve days.
SwitzerlandStaff at the Elikya Ebola Treatment Centre in Ituri walked out over unpaid wages on 25 July, the second centre to strike in under two weeks after Rwampara.
Payroll delays are keeping donor money from reaching front-line workers. Each walkout cuts into the care capacity patients depend on.
Patients still waiting on a laboratory result occupy between 55% and 64% of every Ebola isolation bed in DR Congo, Africa CDC found.
Unconfirmed patients awaiting lab results fill 55 to 64% of every Ebola isolation bed in DR Congo, Africa CDC reported. That crowds out confirmed cases.
Suspects must be isolated before results arrive, whether they test positive or not. Testing now consumes the very capacity it should protect.
Africa CDC put Bundibugyo case fatality at 44.1% on 27 July, up from about 39.7% a week earlier, and attributes the rise to later presentation and saturated treatment sites.
Bundibugyo Ebola's case-fatality rate crossed 40%, rising from about 39.7% on 20 July to 44.1% on 27 July. Africa CDC reported the figures.
Africa CDC blames later patient presentation and overloaded treatment sites, not a more dangerous virus. The same bed and testing bottlenecks straining the response explain the rise.
Health minister Chris Baryomunsi declared Uganda's outbreak over in Kampala on 28 July, thirty days before the surveillance window WHO recorded as running to 27 August.
Uganda's health minister, Dr Chris Baryomunsi, declared the country Ebola-free on 28 July. That came thirty days before the World Health Organization's own 42-day countdown was due to close on 27 August.
Uganda's ministry, the WHO and Africa CDC each give a different account of why the early closure was allowed. This briefing reports the conflict without picking a side.
Panzi Hospital recorded an 85% rise in sexual-violence survivors over the first half of 2026, in figures released on 30 July, while MSF reports care in Ituri has all but vanished.
SwitzerlandPanzi Hospital in South Kivu recorded 646 new sexual-violence survivors between January and June, an 85% rise on last year. The figures were released 30 July.
The surge is driven by the same conflict displacing people, not by the Ebola outbreak. Both crises now strain the same overstretched clinics.
The United States confirmed 2,318 measles cases by 24 July, beating the 2,289 logged across all of 2025, with no deaths recorded so far this year.
The US confirmed 2,318 measles cases by 24 July, passing 2025's full-year record of 2,289. Utah and Virginia lead the state counts.
CIDRAP counts zero deaths in 2026, against three last year, and a lower hospitalisation rate than 2025 despite the record case total.
WHO reported three human H9N2 avian influenza infections in China between 10 and 16 July. Two four-year-olds recovered; a 44-year-old man remains in intensive care.
The World Health Organization reported three new human H9N2 bird-flu cases in China between 10 and 16 July. All three had live-poultry contact.
H9N2 is a milder, separate subtype from H5N1. Its quiet spread in poultry makes it a genetic donor that can feed more dangerous flu strains.
CEPI announced on 31 July that a vaccine candidate matched to Bundibugyo ebolavirus has entered production for clinical trials, with up to $8.5m behind it.
The Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, CEPI, announced on 31 July that the first vaccine built specifically for Bundibugyo Ebola has entered trial production. Developer Hilleman Laboratories is based in Singapore.
No licensed vaccine currently works against this species, since existing shots target the different Zaire strain. This outbreak has had no matched vaccine until now.
Uganda and DR Congo closed their common frontier to non-essential travel for four weeks, screening 4,772 travellers at 32 entry points and building capacity on the Congolese side.
Uganda and DR Congo closed their shared border to non-essential travel for four weeks. They screened 4,772 travellers at 32 entry points.
Uganda also helped build two mobile labs and an 80-bed treatment unit just inside DRC. That puts new capacity closer to where cases are occurring.
Africa CDC's Rt estimate of 1.08-1.15 in its 27 July 2026 sitrep, and its 342-431 case seven-day projection, point to continued growth, not a plateau. The specific mechanism to watch is an undetected case crossing from DRC into Uganda: 15 of Uganda's 20 cases arrived from Congo, and a single unnoticed crossing after 28 July 2026 would reopen an outbreak Kampala has just declared closed. The second mechanism is capacity, not incidence: if Africa CDC's flagged hotspots at Nizi and Nia-Nia pull cases toward North Kivu's already-overloaded wards rather than Ituri's 264 spare beds, case-fatality keeps climbing on saturation alone, independent of any change in the virus.
