Ebola Outbreak in DRC Threatens One Million with Poverty, Billions in Economic Losses Across Africa

The Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) could push almost one million additional people into poverty and inflict billions of dollars in economic losses across Africa, the UN has warned.

The outbreak is not only a health emergency but a broader development crisis that is disrupting livelihoods, trade and public services across affected countries, according to a new UN Development Programme (UNDP) analysis.

It estimates that as many as 985,000 people could be forced into poverty as a result of the economic shock triggered by the outbreak, with women disproportionately affected due to their reliance on informal trade and frontline health work.

UNDP said the Ebola outbreak, declared on 15 May, is already fuelling job losses, reducing household incomes and weakening local markets, particularly in areas with high levels of cross-border trade.

It cautioned that the wider economic cost to Africa could reach up to $3.6 billion in a worst-case scenario, alongside the loss of hundreds of thousands of jobs. Efforts to contain the spread of the virus spread have been hampered by weak health infrastructure, misinformation and the fallout of global aid cuts, including the slashing of US aid overseen by President Donald Trump last year.

“Last year was a shock to the system in the DRC – it’s one of the least developed countries,” Noemi Dalmonte, the deputy representative in the DRC for the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), previously told The Independent. “That shock created a situation that made an outbreak easy because the health system was very dependent on international aid.”

It comes as a suspected case of Ebola discovered at a hospital in Scotland tested negative on Tuesday evening at Glasgow’s Queen Elizabeth University Hospital after arriving during the early hours of the morning.

The outbreak has so far caused over 1,300 confirmed infections and killed more than 370 across the eastern provinces of Ituri, North Kivu and ​South Kivu. A small number of cases have also been detected in Uganda, with modeling published in The Lancet Infectious Diseases last week warning of a possible spread to South Sudan within weeks.

The Independent has hard warnings from experts of a “real risk” the outbreak expanding within the DRC, or regionally.

Congolese health authorities are currently tracing people potentially exposed in two provinces that were not previously affected: Tshopo and Haut-Uele, which borders South Sudan.

In Tshopo province, ​health workers are tracing people who may have been exposed ⁠to the body of a pregnant woman who died of Ebola in ​Ituri’s Niania health zone.

The new infections in Haut-Uele involve contacts with a confirmed Ituri case, DRC government spokesman Patrick Muyaya said.

It underscores concern about the spread of the Bundibugyo strain, which has no approved vaccine or specific treatment.

DRC authorities have banned mass gatherings in the capital, Kinshasa, and three other provinces in a bid to curb the spread.