African governments and international development partners have secured approximately $498.8 million in pledges and commitments to strengthen response efforts against the ongoing outbreak of the rare Bundibugyo Ebola Virus across affected and high-risk countries on the continent.
Gatekeepers News reports that the disclosure was made on Monday by Jean Kaseya, Director-General of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC), in a statement shared on X.
Kaseya said African countries and development partners were working together to mobilise resources needed to contain the outbreak and strengthen emergency response operations.
“Today, during the High-Level Ministerial Meeting, governments and partners announced approximately US$498.8 million in pledges and commitments to strengthen response efforts across affected and high-risk countries,” he stated.
He described the funding commitments as a strong show of African solidarity, leadership, and collective responsibility toward protecting the continent’s health security.
Kaseya stressed that as the outbreak continues to evolve within a complex environment, rapid response measures, effective coordination, and public trust remain critical to containing transmission and saving lives.
Meanwhile, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO), disclosed that the death toll linked to the Bundibugyo Ebola Virus has risen to 220.
“At the moment, the epidemic is outpacing us,” Ghebreyesus warned.
Health experts say the Bundibugyo strain currently driving the outbreak has no approved vaccine or targeted treatment.
Bundibugyo ebolavirus is considered one of the rarest Ebola species known to infect humans and has only previously been associated with two outbreaks — one in Uganda in 2007 and another in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo in 2012.
Most Ebola vaccines and antibody therapies currently available were developed specifically for the more widespread and deadlier Zaire Ebola strain, which caused the devastating West African Ebola epidemic between 2014 and 2016 that killed more than 11,000 people.
Last week, Tom Fletcher, the United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, announced on X that the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) had approved up to $60 million from its emergency response fund to support efforts to contain the outbreak in Central Africa.
The emergency allocation came five days after the WHO declared the outbreak a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC), warning that there is currently no approved vaccine or specific treatment for the Bundibugyo strain spreading across the region.
During the ministerial meeting, major funding commitments included $160 million from the World Bank for Congo, $82 million from the United States, and approximately $57 million from European partners.
The outbreak continues to spread across parts of Central Africa, especially in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Uganda.
According to available figures, the DRC has recorded 906 suspected cases, 105 confirmed cases, 223 suspected deaths, and 10 confirmed deaths linked to the outbreak.
Uganda has so far reported seven confirmed cases and one confirmed death, with health officials indicating that five of the cases have epidemiological links to the first two confirmed infections.
