Africa’s rapidly expanding Ebola outbreak has reached Europe after France confirmed its first imported case linked to the epidemic in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), marking the virus’s first known spread beyond the continent since the latest outbreak began.
The French Ministry of Health said the patient is a doctor who recently returned from a humanitarian mission in one of the Ebola-affected areas of eastern DRC.
Health officials have launched an epidemiological investigation to identify anyone who may have been exposed to the virus. Close contacts will be placed under medical monitoring and asked to self-isolate for 21 days, in line with Ebola’s maximum incubation period.
The ministry said France’s specialised infectious disease centres are equipped to manage highly contagious pathogens and stressed that the measures were designed to eliminate any risk of onward transmission.
WHO urges calm
