The comparison is the part that should command attention. In the 2013-2016 West Africa epidemic, the deadliest Ebola outbreak on record, it took roughly eight months to reach a thousand deaths. This outbreak took under ten weeks [1].
Declared in May and centred on Mongbwalu in the Democratic Republic of Congo's Ituri province, it had passed 1,309 deaths as of Saturday, against 2,973 confirmed cases - a 40 percent rise in deaths over five days [1].
The reason the response looks different from recent Ebola outbreaks is the strain. The vaccines and monoclonal treatments that brought previous epidemics under control were developed against the Zaire species. This is Bundibugyo, a rarer strain, and there is no approved vaccine or treatment for it [1].
Clinicians are managing cases with supportive care and containment, which is the medicine of 2014.
Work has started. An Oxford trial dosed its first volunteer on Friday [1] - one person, at the beginning of a process that will not produce a licensed product in time for this outbreak.
Jean Kaseya, Director-General of Africa CDC, stated the stakes without hedging: 'If we do not stop it today, this will become the worst outbreak the world has ever documented' [1].
