UK pledges additional £50 million to help contain Ebola outbreak in Congo


FILE PHOTO: UNICEF staff and airport workers receive an aircraft carrying medical supplies as authorities and aid agencies intensified efforts to contain a new Ebola outbreak at the Bunia National Airport in Bunia, Ituri province, Democratic Republic of Congo, May 19, 2026. REUTERS/Gradel Muyisa Mumbere/File Photo

Sept 1 (Reuters) - Britain ⁠said on Tuesday it would provide ⁠more than £50 million ($67.56 million) in new ‌funding to support efforts to contain an Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo, where ​confirmed cases have surpassed 6,000 ⁠in the country's ⁠largest-ever epidemic.

• Britain allocated up to £20 million to ⁠the ‌Ebola response in May, and the latest funding brings its ⁠total contribution to £78 million.

• The funding will ​support ‌disease surveillance, frontline health workers, treatment access, ⁠infection ​control, community outreach and safe burials, Britain's Foreign Office said.

• British public health experts ⁠have been deployed in Congo ​to support the efforts.

• "As the outbreak intensifies, we are accelerating our response to match the ⁠pace and scale of the challenge," Britain's Minister for Africa Kirsty McNeill said.

• The epidemic - the second-largest and fastest-spreading on ​record - was caused by ⁠the rare Bundibugyo strain of the virus, ​for which there are ‌no approved vaccines or ​treatments.

($1 = 0.7401 pounds)

(Reporting by Sumedha Mukherjee in Bengaluru; Editing by Jamie Freed)

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