Doctors' Perilous Fight Against Ebola in the DRC

**Brian Lehrer** (0:10)
It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning again, everyone. The epicenter of the ongoing Ebola outbreak is the Democratic Republic of Congo, but this is also a US story because of the Trump administration's withdrawal from global as well as domestic public health. I wanna read you a quote from a recent story about the current situation. This comes to us from Amy Maxman, PhD, public health correspondent at KFF Health News.
And these are the words of Elizabeth Faraha, a medical director at a clinic in the northeast of the Congo. Quote, we live with fear in our stomachs. Every day there are health care providers and patients dying.
So as the Ebola outbreak rages, clinics in the DRC like the one Dr. Faraha directs, lack protective equipment, tests, clean water, Maxman reports. And this all comes amid the United States' withdrawal from World Health, and at least in part, because of it. Though the CDC says that for now, the overall risk to the American public and travelers remains low, there are real fears that this outbreak could grow to be Congo's biggest Ebola outbreak ever. So we'll talk about all of this now, domestic and international aspects with Amy Maxman, who has a long track record reporting on Ebola. She has a new story on KFF Health News with the headline, We Live in Fear in Congo, Doctors Face Ebola with Little Protection. Amy, welcome back to the show. We always learn a lot from you when you come on with us. Hi.

**Amy Maxmen** (1:46)
Hi, it's a pleasure to be here.

**Brian Lehrer** (1:49)
Listeners, any questions or personal connections to the ongoing Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda as well? 212-433-WNYC. If we have anybody listening who has experience working on Ebola prevention perhaps or treatment or anybody with ties to the regions affected, you can help us report this story or anyone may call with a question. 212-433-WNYC. Call or text 212-433-9692.
The numbers, Amy, I know only tell part of the story, but what did you reveal in your reporting about the extent of the ongoing Ebola outbreak so far?

**Amy Maxmen** (2:34)
Yeah, even though this was only detected a few weeks ago, it clearly has been spreading for weeks and probably months earlier. As of the most recent numbers from June 8th, yesterday, we have 550 confirmed Ebola cases and 101 deaths in Congo and another 19 in Uganda. That's definitely an undercount. There's a real lack of testing. Tests take about six days to turn around, is what I heard from doctors in the area, if at all. Then, like you mentioned in your intro, I had a heartbreaking conversations with doctors who lack the most basic protection.
They're running out of clean water.
I talked with somebody who can't afford to put a mattress on the ground for patients and there's been at least 34 Ebola infections among healthcare workers and seven have died. It's a really terrible situation.

**Brian Lehrer** (3:32)
Can you talk specifically about how important tests are? Because my understanding is some Ebola symptoms are fairly common and could be indicators of other things.

**Amy Maxmen** (3:42)
Yes, exactly. We really need tests.
Ebola, at least when it starts out, it starts out with a fever, vomiting, maybe stomach pain. Those are problems you could have with malaria. It causes a lot of joint pain, malaria, or many other infections. It's really hard to know that it is Ebola. Now, this means if somebody comes into a hospital, do they have Ebola? So you want to know because you want to separate them from everyone else. But if you can't get a test back, how can you do that? Or how do you know to fully protect yourself, especially when gear is so limited? So tests are really the first key. People always think about Ebola vaccines and Ebola treatments, and yes, that's important, but tests are really foundational.

**Brian Lehrer** (4:30)
Are Ebola tests expensive to produce?

**Amy Maxmen** (4:33)
No. The trick is because there was a big, basically, a basic lab, like most labs in the US, you can test for Ebola. The trick is the labs in Eastern Congo are not well-stocked. There was a good one in Goma, kind of the capital of the Eastern Congo, but that fell into disarray when a armed group called M23 took over last year in that area. So tests now, samples need to be sent all the way to the capital city in Kinshasa, and that can take a long time because flights are suspended, roads are really poor.
It took six days for the first test to the first samples to get to Kinshasa, and I hear actually the timeline is not much better now.