A tent used for treating people with Ebola in eastern Congo was set on fire for the second time this week, and 18 people suspected of being infected with the Bundibugyo virus escaped into the community, a local hospital director has said16:56, 23 May 2026A treatment tent used during the Ebola outbreak in eastern Congo was set ablaze for the second time in a week, with 18 suspected infected individuals fleeing the scene, a local hospital director confirmed on Saturday.‌Unidentified individuals descended upon the clinic in Mongbwalu — a town at the epicentre of the Bundibugyo virus outbreak, a rare strain of Ebola — on Friday night, torching a tent erected by humanitarian organisation Doctors Without Borders for suspected and confirmed Ebola patients, Dr Richard Lokudi, director of the Mongbwalu General Reference Hospital said.‌"We strongly condemn this act, as it caused panic among the staff of the Mongbwalu Referral Hospital and also resulted in the escape of 18 suspected cases into the community," he said. On Thursday, a separate treatment centre in the town of Rwampara was razed to the ground after family members were barred from reclaiming the body of a local man.‌The remains of Ebola victims are highly contagious and can trigger further transmission when families handle them for burial or gather for funeral services. Authorities are taking charge of burying suspected victims wherever possible, a move that has been met with resistance from grieving families and friends.A burial for Ebola patients in Rwampara took place on Saturday under heavy security, as tensions between health workers and the local community reached boiling point, according to David Basima, a Red Cross team leader overseeing burials. "Arriving at the (healthcare) structure, we experienced a lot of difficulties, including resistance from young people and the community. So we were forced to alert the authorities so that they could come to our aid, just for safety," said Basima.‌In a bid to contain the spread of the virus, authorities in north-eastern Congo imposed a ban on Friday on funeral wakes and gatherings of more than 50 people. The World Health Organization (WHO) upgraded the outbreak's risk level for Congo from "high" to "very high", though it maintained that the likelihood of the disease spreading globally remains low.‌WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus confirmed on Friday that 82 cases and seven deaths have been verified in Congo, adding that the outbreak is thought to be "much larger."No vaccine currently exists for the Bundibugyo virus, which went undetected for weeks in Congo's Ituri province following the first known fatality, while authorities were testing for a more common strain of the Ebola virus, which returned a negative result. The number of suspected cases has now reached 750, with 177 suspected deaths, and these figures are expected to rise as surveillance efforts are broadened.‌Dr Jean Kaseya, director-general of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, stressed that tackling the outbreak effectively must involve fostering trust within local communities. The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies announced on Saturday that three of its volunteers had perished from the outbreak in Mongbwalu. The organisation said it suspected the three healthcare workers caught the virus while conducting dead body management activities on March 27 as part of a humanitarian mission unrelated to Ebola.Article continues belowThis would substantially shift back the timeline of the outbreak from the earlier first confirmed death in late April in the town of Bunia, the capital of Ituri.