BUNIA, Congo — A camp sheltering 10,000 displaced people in eastern Congo faces a deadly Ebola outbreak with just one handwashing station and one infrared thermometer to protect an entire community already devastated by years of conflict and neglect.
In the so-called ISP camp near Bunia, a city at the heart of the outbreak, camp leaders tell residents to wash their hands before eating—with soap for those fortunate enough to have it. For everyone else, the advice is to use oatmeal or sand.
Living Without Basic Protection
"My fear is that we are here with nothing to protect ourselves. We have no protection, no water or soap, and we live near garbage," said Francine Leve Janguzi, a camp resident, as she opened an empty tap in a sea of tarpaulin roofs. Janguzi has lived in the camp for eight and a half years. "Now we're hearing about Ebola," she said. "Look at the state of where we're sleeping. We don't have any help whatsoever. We don't have soap or water, yet we're told to wash our hands regularly and be clean."
Supplies are being rushed to Ituri province as aid groups and healthcare workers attempt to stem an outbreak of the infectious disease that has been declared a global health emergency. Front-line responders are deeply concerned the disease might spread to the large displacement camps located near Bunia, where thousands of people are crammed into limited space without access to basic hygiene.
Years of Conflict Leave Health Systems Devastated
"Eastern DRC's years of conflict and displacement have left health systems on their knees, and that makes containing this outbreak all the harder," said Heather Kerr, Congo director with the International Rescue Committee. Gabriela Arenas, a regional coordinator at the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, said the outbreak is "unfolding in communities already facing insecurity, displacement and fragile healthcare systems."
Almost a million people have been displaced from their homes by conflict in Ituri, according to the U.N. The majority of residents of the ISP camp, which owes its name to its proximity to the Higher Pedagogical Institute, or Institut Superieur Pedagogique in French, were forced to leave their villages in the Djugu territory following attacks by CODECO, one of the multiple armed groups which operate in the region.
There is no vaccine or treatment for the rare Bundibugyo type of Ebola, which has been spreading undetected for weeks in eastern Congo. Standard tests struggle to detect the Bundibugyo. Over 1,000 suspected cases and at least 220 deaths had already been recorded as of Tuesday, including seven confirmed cases in Uganda. But the World Health Organization and aid groups on the ground say the outbreak is much larger.
Insecurity Compounds the Crisis
Ebola is a highly contagious virus and can be contracted from bodily fluids such as vomit, blood or semen. The disease it causes is rare but severe and often fatal. Symptoms include fever, headache, muscle pain, weakness, diarrhea, vomiting, stomach pain and unexplained bleeding or bruising.
Eastern Congo has for years seen attacks by dozens of separate rebel and militant groups, some of them with links to foreign countries or the extremist Islamic State group. The Rwanda-backed M23 rebels are in control of parts of the region. While the Congolese government still largely controls the northeastern Ituri Province, the epicenter of the Ebola outbreak, that control is tenuous. The Allied Democratic Forces, a Ugandan Islamist group linked to IS, is one of the dominant rebel groups there and responsible for violent attacks against civilian targets.
Before the outbreak, humanitarian group Doctors Without Borders said in an assessment that the insecurity in Ituri had worsened recently, causing doctors and nurses to flee and leaving overwhelmed health facilities and in some parts, "catastrophic conditions."
Gérard Maki, a community leader in the camp, said the disease is very frightening. "I've learned that there's no cure, which is why it scares me. ... Our government should also do everything possible to find a solution to this disease."
Why This Matters:
The Ebola outbreak in eastern Congo exposes how years of armed conflict and international neglect have left displaced communities without the most basic tools to protect themselves from a deadly epidemic. Nearly a million people forced from their homes by violence now face a global health emergency with virtually no access to clean water, soap, or medical resources. The crisis demonstrates the devastating human cost when health systems collapse under the weight of prolonged insecurity and inadequate international support. Without urgent intervention to provide basic hygiene infrastructure and medical supplies to displacement camps, the outbreak threatens to spiral further out of control among the region's most vulnerable populations, who have already endured years of violence and abandonment.