Militants affiliated with the Islamic State burned down a health center treating Ebola patients in the Democratic Republic of Congo this week, forcing infected patients to flee amid violence that killed dozens of people, according to health and United Nations officials.
At least 44 people were killed in the attacks, officials said. It started late Thursday around Cantine-Aloya, a village about 28 miles west of Beni, a city in eastern Congo. Many homes were burned, forcing residents to flee the area.
The violence is a major blow to efforts to contain the country’s Ebola outbreak. Since the first case was detected in May, it has already become the second-largest outbreak on record, spreading across a vast area spanning eight provinces in eastern Congo.
Infections have fallen in some areas but are soaring in places threatened by armed groups that the response effort has not reached. After three decades of conflict, over 100 armed groups are present in eastern Congo. Some of the areas they control or threaten have become Ebola hot spots, hampering urgent efforts to contain the rapidly spreading outbreak.
The danger is particularly acute from the Allied Democratic Forces, the group that carried out the attack this week in Cantine-Aloya. Recognized by the Islamic State as an affiliate in 2019, the A.D.F. has a reputation for especially brutal attacks that often include beheadings, rape and the abduction of children.
A preliminary report on the attack, based on briefings from U.N. and health officials on the ground, described scenes of terror in Cantine-Aloya on Thursday night and Friday morning. The report, which is not public but was seen by The New York Times, said the attack shut down efforts to fight Ebola in the area on Friday. Cantine-Aloya has recorded 126 Ebola infections, 83 of them currently under treatment.
Among those who fled the town’s health facility were a confirmed Ebola patient and five people with suspected cases, three of whom were viewed as high risk, a local doctor told Reuters.
On Friday night, young people in the town lit fires to keep watch against more attacks, U.N. officials said.
The attacks were the latest from the A.D.F. in the province of North Kivu, one of the most recent hot spots of the Ebola outbreak, after a period of relative calm. U.N. officials fear that sudden population movements prompted by the attacks, which led thousands of people to flee their homes, risk accelerating the spread of the virus.
The A.D.F. has about 700 fighters, according to some estimates. But accurate information is scarce because the group hides deep in the forests of eastern Congo and has little contact with outside groups.
The group has a history of violence against aid workers. In 2013, four employees of Doctors Without Borders were kidnapped by A.D.F. fighters in an attack on a village in North Kivu. One escaped a year later, but the three others were never found.
The State Department designated the A.D.F. as a Foreign Terrorist Organization in 2021. In recent years it has funded its activities through the gold trade, according to a recent report by the Sentry, a research body based in Washington.
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