Uganda Reports No More Ebola Cases After Outbreak

Uganda’s health authorities announced the country currently has no patients with Ebola after the last confirmed patient was discharged from hospital on Thursday. The outbreak officially began May 15 in the Democratic Republic of Congo, spreading to Uganda’s border region. Uganda recorded 20 confirmed cases, with two fatalities, and all other patients recovered.

The country must now maintain 42 days without any new cases to be officially declared free of the virus, following World Health Organization guidelines. Hundreds of contacts were isolated for 21 days as a preventative measure.

Health officials plan to strengthen border controls to prevent future cross-border transmission. While the DRC continues to battle a larger outbreak with nearly 2,000 confirmed cases and over 700 deaths, the WHO cautions the actual scale of the epidemic may be two to four times greater.