The World Health Organization (WHO) declared the official end of the Ebola outbreak in Uganda on Thursday (27), after the country completed 42 consecutive days without a single new confirmed case. The announcement was made jointly with the Africa CDC, the African Union's disease control agency.
What is confirmed
According to the WHO, the last confirmed Ebola patient in Uganda was discharged on July 16. It was an imported case from another country, and no onward transmission linked to it was documented. The 42-day window equals two full cycles of the virus's maximum 21-day incubation period and is the standard criterion the agency uses to declare an outbreak over.
In total, Uganda recorded 20 cases of Ebola and two deaths, nearly all involving people who had traveled from the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), according to the AFP news agency. The WHO's Africa regional office reports that the first patient was seen on May 8 at a clinic in Arua, a town in northern Uganda on the DRC border, and later traveled to the capital, Kampala, where the diagnosis was confirmed. The virus responsible belongs to the Bundibugyo species.
"Uganda has completed 42 days since the last confirmed Ebola patient, imported from another country, was discharged on July 16, 2026, with no subsequent documented transmission, marking the end of the outbreak," the WHO said in a statement.
The DRC outbreak goes on
The end of the outbreak in Uganda does not mean the regional emergency is over. In the DRC, where the outbreak was declared on May 15, there have been more than 5,600 confirmed cases and more than 2,700 deaths, according to AFP. It is the fastest-spreading Ebola outbreak on record. The WHO and the Africa CDC praised the containment measures taken by the Ugandan government, health workers and partners, but urged countries in the region to keep surveillance and preparedness in place, given the risk of new imported cases across the border.
Ebola spreads through direct contact with the bodily fluids of infected people and causes hemorrhagic fever. Unlike respiratory viruses such as flu or covid-19, it does not spread through the air, which makes contact tracing and case isolation effective containment tools, as the outcome in Uganda shows.
What readers should know: for anyone who has not been to the affected region or had close contact with sick travelers from it, the risk is low. Those traveling to East Africa should avoid contact with the bodily fluids of sick people and with contaminated items. After returning, they should seek immediate medical care if they develop fever, severe headache, vomiting or bleeding within 21 days, and tell the health service about their travel history.