“I hope we’ll be up to the task”: In DR Congo, fear of Ebola at the gates of Kinshasa
Kinshasa is now under siege. The Ebola Virus is no more confined to Ituri, as of today it spreads to 5 other provinces and is now threatening the DR-Congo capital.
In a late Q&A post I made, I shared a part of my work as a journalist with the subreddit. Some people where curious to know where the photo came from. It is from a piece I just published for the french newspaper La Croix. Here for the non-french speaker a rough translation I made.
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On the Congo River, as the Ebola outbreak gains ground, authorities are stepping up vigilance in the hope of stopping the virus at the threshold of the Congolese capital. According to figures released on Monday, August 17, 2,325 people have died in the country.
With a jacket bearing the slogan “Stop Ebola” on the back and a megaphone in hand, Dr. Jacques Kulemfuka spends his day with his feet in the water. In Maluku, a municipality on the banks of the Congo River, 65 kilometers upstream from Kinshasa, the doctor and his colleagues have been deployed for two weeks. Every day, the Ebola response team monitors the flow of boats heading toward the megacity of 20 million people.
No boat is allowed to continue toward the capital until all its passengers have undergone a thorough screening and any vessel deemed suspicious has been decontaminated with chlorinated water. “Please remain calm and wait, we’ll let you leave shortly,” Dr. Kulemfuka calls out once again. Protests — and a few choice insults — erupt from the immobilized boats. Some passengers, stranded for nearly a day, sit in resigned silence, waiting to resume their journey.
“The risk of an outbreak starting in Kinshasa is now very real. That is why no exceptions and no shortcuts are allowed when it comes to checking the boats,” warns Dr. Freddy Mukady, who is in charge of the Ebola response at the river checkpoint.
The capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DR Congo) has been placed on alert. On August 5, authorities received a report that a boat from the north of the country was carrying a passenger who had died of an unknown illness during the journey. They intercepted the vessel and inspected it before it could dock in the capital. After being held for several days, the alert was eventually lifted. But the concern remains.
From his office in Kinshasa, Jean-Jacques Muyembe, director of the National Institute of Biomedical Research and one of the co-discoverers of the Ebola virus in 1976, nevertheless seeks to reassure the public about the authorities’ ability to respond should the virus appear in the capital. “Our capacity to detect the virus is unlimited,” he says.
Back in Maluku, around ten boats are inspected every day by the health response teams. On board, families and, above all, traders transport cassava, fish and other perishable goods to Kinshasa’s markets.
On the deck of the Samuel, patience is wearing thin. More than a hundred travelers have been waiting for 24 hours for clearance, exhausted after five days of sailing from the neighboring province of Kwilu. In theory, inspecting a vessel should take only 30 to 45 minutes. In practice, it can take anywhere from 24 to 48 hours, the time needed to collect samples, wait for the results and issue the documents required to pass through customs. “We also detect cases of measles and cholera on the boats. We cannot allow people who could trigger another outbreak to enter the city,” Dr. Mukady explains.
This health precaution comes at a cost: authorities have limited resources to feed and supply passengers whose boats have been immobilized. On the first day of the checks, some travelers even jumped into the water in an attempt to reach the shore. “Ebola? We don’t have that disease where we come from,” one passenger insists. Around him, several people begin debating the issue. “We understand the reasons for the measures, and we are cooperating. But we don’t know what is happening, and it’s frightening. We just want to continue our journey and sell our goods in Kinshasa,” says Jérémie Mutambala, a trader from Bandundu, in Kwilu province.
At Baramoto, a port market near Kinshasa’s city downtown, the fear of the outbreak seems a long way away. Among the stalls selling dried fish and second-hand clothes, Ebola is met with indifference, even disdain. “It’s a disease of people from the East,” says Jean-Sauveur Kama, a port trader, leaning against his stall where all kinds of bushmeat are displayed: armadilo, crocodile and monkey.
And yet this is where prevention begins, along the river, where fear, rumors and travelers intersect. On their phones, passengers aboard the boats held up in Maluku are meanwhile learning about the outbreak by scrolling through social media posts.
Lydie Musekwa, founder of the Censweb association, is a content creator involved in prevention efforts. She has posted three videos about Ebola on TikTok since May. “Then an influencer publicly apologized for spreading false information and took down his video,” says the entrepreneur, who favors dialogue over denunciation. A drop in the ocean among the hundreds of posts circulating every week that promote dubious theories about the outbreak.
Deep distrust of the authorities, combined with the vastness of the DRC — where four other national languages are officially recognized alongside French — creates fertile ground for misinformation. “Sometimes, when someone is scrolling through their social media feed and comes across information in French, they simply move on to the next post without reading or listening to it, because French is not their mother tongue,” the influencer explains.
“There is a lack of awareness among Congolese people that Ebola exists and that it is transmitted through contact. Once that awareness takes hold among the population, the spread of the disease will stop,” says Professor Jean-Jacques Muyembe, one of the virus’s co-discoverers.
At the Cinquantenaire University Hospital, authorities are preparing for the possible arrival of patients. Around twenty beds have been set up to care for future patients. If necessary, we are told, capacity could be increased to 250 beds.
But the public hospital has only just emerged from a strike that began several months ago over recurring salary-payment problems and staff shortages denounced by unions. Some healthcare workers are already sounding the alarm.
“We’ve heard many stories about Ebola virus disease. When we see what is happening in the east, I’m worried. I hope we’ll be up to the task when the coming shock hits,” says a doctor who prefers to remain anonymous. Last week, the National Institute of Public Health received six alerts requiring investigation over potential suspected Ebola cases in the capital. In Kinshasa, the virus is not here yet. But along the banks of the river, the capital is already holding its breath.
