The Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Uganda could lead to more than 20,000 cases and over 2,000 deaths in a worst-case scenario, according to a report published Friday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.Subscribe to read this story ad-free Get unlimited access to ad-free articles and exclusive content.That scenario — modeled using data through May 24, when about 50 deaths had been reported — assumes that only 20% of Ebola patients isolate and that access to vaccines and treatments is limited, the agency said.
The outbreak is caused by a rare type of Ebola called Bundibugyo that currently has no available vaccines or treatments.Even in a more optimistic scenario, with around 70% of cases isolating, the report found that there remains about a 1 in 5 chance that the outbreak could surpass 10,000 cases within three months.Dr.Krutika Kuppalli, an infectious diseases physician at UT Southwestern Medical Center in Texas and a former World Health Organization medical officer, called the projections “concerning.”“Under certain scenarios, the current Bundibugyo Ebola outbreak could grow into one of the largest Ebola outbreaks ever recorded,” she wrote in an email.Still, “one of the most important takeaways from this CDC analysis is that the future of this outbreak is still very much within our control,” Kuppalli said.“The findings should serve as a call to action for the international community,” she said.There have been 397 confirmed cases and 65 deaths in the outbreak, according to the World Health Organization.On a call with reporters Friday, Jason Asher, the director of the CDC’s Center for Forecasting and Outbreak Analytics, stressed that this modeling “is not a forecast; it is a planning tool.” The models are limited by questions that remain about the Bundibugyo strain, how many people are in isolation and how widely the outbreak could spread in the months ahead.“Our models today are built on curr...