Ebola cases in Uganda rise to 9, while 265 others are being monitored under quarantine

KAMPALA, Uganda (AP) - Ebola cases in Uganda have risen to nine, while 265 other people were being monitored under quarantine, health authorities said Tuesday.

The nine include the first victim, a male nurse who died the day before the outbreak was declared on Jan. 30. That man remains the only fatality.

Eight patients “are receiving medical care and are in stable condition," a Health Ministry statement said. Seven of them were admitted to the main public hospital in Kampala, the Ugandan capital, in addition to one being treated in the eastern district of Mbale, the ministry said, adding that "the situation is under control" amid heightened surveillance.

The nurse who died had first sought treatment in Kampala and later traveled to Mbale, where he was admitted to a public hospital. Health authorities said that the man also sought the services of a traditional healer. His relatives are among those being treated for Ebola.

Kampala has a highly mobile population of about 4 million, and officials are still investigating the source of the outbreak.

Tracing contacts is key to stemming the spread of Ebola, which manifests as a viral hemorrhagic fever.

There are no approved vaccines for the Sudan strain of Ebola that is infecting people in Uganda. But authorities have launched a clinical study to further test the safety and efficacy of a trial vaccine as part of measures to stop the spread of the current outbreak.

The last outbreak of Ebola in Uganda, which began in September 2022, killed at least 55 people by the time it was declared over four months later.

Ebola is spread by contact with bodily fluids of an infected person or contaminated materials. Symptoms include fever, vomiting, diarrhea, muscle pain and at times internal and external bleeding.

Scientists suspect that the first person infected in an Ebola outbreak acquires the virus through contact with an infected animal or eating its raw meat. Ebola was discovered in 1976 in two simultaneous outbreaks in South Sudan and Congo, where it occurred in a village near the Ebola River, after which the disease is named.