{"id":780398,"date":"2026-07-05T10:43:11","date_gmt":"2026-07-05T10:43:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/780398\/"},"modified":"2026-07-05T10:43:11","modified_gmt":"2026-07-05T10:43:11","slug":"ebola-treatment-trial-begins-in-congo-as-citizens-mourn-hundreds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/780398\/","title":{"rendered":"Ebola treatment trial begins in Congo as citizens mourn hundreds"},"content":{"rendered":"<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Residents at the epicentre of the Democratic Republic of Congo\u2019s (DRC\u2019s) Ebola outbreak are pinning their hopes on experimental treatments after researchers began a highly anticipated study in early July of two possible Ebola treatments in hopes of fighting the still-growing outbreak.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">At the Ebola treatment centre inside Bunia\u2019s Evangelical Medical Centre, in eastern Congo\u2019s Ituri province, the launch of the research was marked by urgency rather than ceremony on Thursday.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">As ambulances continued arriving and healthcare workers disappeared behind layers of protective equipment into isolation wards, the research effort unfolded quietly alongside the daily struggle to keep patients alive.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">The virus causing this outbreak, called Bundibugyo, is less common than others that cause Ebola disease and there are no specific treatments or vaccines for it.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Already more than 1,400 people have been diagnosed and 438 have died, the head of the World Health Organization (WHO), Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said on Thursday.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Health workers at the Evangelical Medical Centre in Bunia on Friday. Ebola clinical trials are taking place there. Photo: AP\" data-qa=\"BaseImage-handleRenderImage-StyledImage\" class=\"e1gf69pb2 css-6ikqhs e445x7d0\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/e6a09257-3242-47e4-a907-5a6ef05c429d_0c42f09f.jpg\" title=\"Health workers at the Evangelical Medical Centre in Bunia on Friday. Ebola clinical trials are taking place there. Photo: AP\"\/>Health workers at the Evangelical Medical Centre in Bunia on Friday. Ebola clinical trials are taking place there. Photo: AP<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">The WHO-supported trial is a collaboration between the DRC\u2019s national biomedical research institute INRB, Britain\u2019s Oxford University, Belgium\u2019s Institute of Tropical Medicine in Antwerp, and other international health groups.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Residents at the epicentre of the Democratic Republic of Congo\u2019s (DRC\u2019s) Ebola outbreak are pinning their hopes on&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":780399,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[345460,369427,64,369428,63,336146,369433,84615,369431,369429,84608,369432,137,369426,346441,369430,14806,18558],"class_list":["post-780398","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health","tag-africa-centres-for-disease-control-and-prevention","tag-antwerps-institute-of-tropical-medicine","tag-au","tag-audrey-tengetenge","tag-australia","tag-bundibugyo","tag-bunia","tag-congo","tag-congos-national-institute-of-public-health","tag-dr-vasee-moorthy","tag-ebola","tag-gladys-munguro","tag-health","tag-inrb","tag-ituri","tag-nelson-dhebi","tag-oxford-university","tag-world-health-organization"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/780398","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=780398"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/780398\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/780399"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=780398"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=780398"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=780398"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}