MBALE- The Government of Uganda has been officially declared Ebola-free at an event held today in Mbale city ending an outbreak announced at the end of January when a 32-year-old nurse succumbed to the disease at Mulago National Referral Hospital.
While speaking at this event attended by officials from the World Health Organisation and UNICEF among others, the Minister of Health Dr Jane Ruth Aceng Ocero said the last positive case had been discharged on 14th March 2025 when they started a 42-day countdown.
The outbreak of the Sudan Ebolavirus Disease was the country’s eighth and affected fourteen people, of which four individuals succumbed to the disease. Of the four, two were laboratory confirmed, and theother two were probable deaths.
Minister Aceng said thzt cases were recorded in seven districts and three cities, and the key lesson learnt from the current outbreak is for individuals to avoid movement whenever they suspect having contracted an unclear infection.
The first confirmed case had moved to several districts, including Mbal,e where he visited a traditional healer, Kampala, Mukono and Wakiso districts.
The second confirmed death of a child also went through related circumstances, whereby he was treated at various health facilities in Kampala, including Mulago National Referral Hospital, but health workers did not suspect or think of testing him for Ebola until he died.
This child had lost a mother and a sibling earlier and these cases were contacts of confirmed cases in Fort Portal city, Kyegegwa and Ntoroko districts.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO) during this outbreak, thrre were 14 cases, 12 confirmed and two not confirmed through laboratory tests were reported and four deaths, two confirmed and two probable, occurred and ten people recovered from the infection.
World Health Organization Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus applauded the Ugandan Health Ministry for its “leadership and commitment” in overcoming the outbreak.
Ebola infections are frequent in Uganda which has many tropical forests that are natural reservoirs for the virus.
The latest outbreak, caused by the Sudan strain of the virus, was detected on January 30th this year when a male nurse contracted the virus and later died and the strain has no approved vaccine and was Uganda’s ninth outbreak since the country recorded its first infection in 2000.
Neighbouring the Democratic Republic of the Congo a country that has experienced more than a dozen outbreaks, including one from 2018 to 2020 which killed nearly 2,300 people Uganda remains highly vulnerable to the spread of the disease.
The latest outbreak began in Kampala, a bustling city of four million people and a key transit hub linking Eastern DRC, Kenya, Rwanda and South Sudan and Health experts say Uganda has been able to leverage on its experience battling the disease over the years to bring them under control relatively quickly.
Ebola is spread through contact with infected bodily fluids and tissues, with symptoms such as severe headache, muscle pain, vomiting blood and internal bleeding.
