Frequently asked questions

Yes. WHO declared a Public Health Emergency of International Concern on 17 May 2026 for an outbreak of Bundibugyo ebolavirus in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (Ituri Province) with confirmed cross-border spread to Uganda (Kampala). See the full active-outbreak briefing for current case counts and geographic detail.

No. The current outbreak is Bundibugyo virus (BDBV). The two approved Ebola vaccines - Ervebo and Zabdeno + Mvabea - target Zaire ebolavirus glycoprotein only. No product on the market today is approved for Bundibugyo virus. This is the single most consequential fact about the 2026 outbreak.

Roughly 27 recognised human ebolavirus outbreaks have occurred between 1976 and the current 2026 PHEIC. Most have been Zaire ebolavirus in central Africa; the 2013–2016 West Africa epidemic was by far the largest, with 28,616 cases and 11,310 deaths.

No. Ebola does not transmit through respiratory aerosols in the way influenza, measles, or tuberculosis do. Transmission requires direct contact with the blood or bodily fluids of an infected person, contact with contaminated surfaces, or sexual transmission from a recovered survivor. Aerosol-generating medical procedures in clinical settings are a separate higher-risk situation that requires specific PPE.

Per WHO, the average across past outbreaks is around 50%, with a range of 25–90% depending on species and quality of supportive care. Zaire ebolavirus has historically been the most lethal (40–90%); Bundibugyo virus has the lowest CFR among pathogenic species (25–51% across prior outbreaks).

WHO reports the incubation period as 2 to 21 days. Most patients develop symptoms within 8 to 10 days of exposure. The 21-day window is the basis for contact-tracing quarantine protocols.

Routine tourist travel to low-risk areas of either country is not categorically prohibited. Risk depends on your activities - see our travel guidance for the tourist, elevated-risk, and high-risk categorisation. Consult your country's foreign-affairs travel advice and consider deferring non-essential travel to Ituri Province or to affected Kampala neighbourhoods.

Through direct contact (broken skin or mucous membranes) with blood, vomit, diarrhoea, semen, saliva, breast milk, or other bodily fluids of someone who is sick with or has died from Ebola. Contaminated needles and surfaces are also documented transmission routes. Sexual transmission from male survivors is possible for an extended period - virus has been detected in semen up to 15 months after recovery.

Yes, with two important caveats. First, the virus can persist in immune-privileged sites (semen, eye, central nervous system) for months. Second, this creates a small but non-zero risk of late-onset complications and sexual transmission. Survivor stigma is itself a major public-health harm and is not justified by the underlying epidemiology.

WHO Disease Outbreak News is the authoritative primary source and we link to it on every page. EbolaIntel exists to translate WHO and CDC technical reports into plain language, to surface strain-specific countermeasure compatibility in one matrix, and to make outbreak history queryable. We don't replace WHO; we make it easier to use.