Kampala: Uganda has reported the second death of a child from Ebola and concerns raised over disease surveillance in the outbreak. A second Ebola patient, a 4-year-old child, has died in Uganda, the World Health Organization said, citing the country’s health ministry. The fatality brings the number of confirmed cases in Uganda to 10. While the health officials hoped for a quick end to the outbreak that began in January, the source of his infection is yet to be traced.
According to Ethiopian News Agency, the child had been hospitalized at the main referral facility in Kampala, the capital of the East African country, and died within three days. WHO said its officials are working with the country’s health officials to strengthen surveillance and contact tracing. There were no other details about the death and local health officials are not commenting on the case.
The death undermines Ugandan officials’ assertions of an outbreak under control after eight Ebola patients were discharged earlier in February. The first victim was a male nurse who died the day before the outbreak was declared on Jan. 30. He had sought treatment at multiple facilities in Kampala and in eastern Uganda, where he also visited a traditional healer in trying to diagnose his illness, before later dying in Kampala.
The successful treatment of eight patients who had been contacts of that man, including some of his relatives, had left local health officials anticipating the outbreak’s end. However, they are still investigating its source. Uganda’s last outbreak, discovered in September 2022, killed at least 55 people before it was declared over in January 2023.
Ebola in Uganda is the latest in a trend of outbreaks of viral hemorrhagic fevers in the east African region. Tanzania declared an outbreak of the Ebola-like Marburg disease in January, and in December, Rwanda announced its own outbreak of Marburg was over. Ebola was discovered in 1976 in simultaneous outbreaks in South Sudan and Congo, where it occurred in a village near the Ebola River, after which the disease is named.