So there's a lot of news going on right now, but something that's continuing to get lost in the noise is the Ebola outbreak happening in a WAR ZONE along with the election turmoil in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Buckle in for my thread.
Right now, the DRC is facing the second largest Ebola outbreak OF ALL TIME. That's 560 cases and 336 deaths -- EVEN WITH an experimental vaccine and treatment. Why is it so bad? Take a look at what responders deal with when trying to stop the outbreak:
North Kivu, the primary province where the outbreak is occurring, has been wracked with violence. Attacks from rebel groups like the ADF or bands of Mai-Mai have ratcheted up. One health worker told @TheLancet “Ebola kills, but the rebels kill more." huffingtonpost.com/entry/ebola-ou…
The DRC just postponed already contentious elections which were supposed to happen Sunday = more unrest. If elections were successful, it'd be the first successful democratic transition of power ever. A lot of folks don't seem to think that success is on the horizon.
I talked to @TheTakeaway about this yesterday, you can listen here, but for background -- outgoing President Joseph Kabila delayed elections for two years. His handpicked successor has been sanctioned by the EU for cracking down on the opposition. wnycstudios.org/story/ebola-ou…
The opposition stronghold is based in the capital of Kinshasa, which just had 80 percent of its voting machines -- which are controversially unproven tablets -- burn down in a mysterious fire. The election commission has since delayed the vote til Dec. 30 reuters.com/article/us-con…
Meanwhile, 2,000 miles away in North Kivu, Ebola continues to spread. This month has seen a number of new cases in hotspots of Butembo -- a city of one million -- and Katwa, which has serious community resistance. Contacts are avoiding follow-up there. huffingtonpost.com/entry/ebola-de…
“Many were known as contacts but had disappeared from follow-up because they don’t want to be found,” @WHO Mike Ryan assistant director-general for emergency preparedness and response told me. “That’s a worrying trend as that means to some extent the disease is underground."
Moral of the story: The Ebola outbreak is continuing to grow, not contract. And now you throw in election turmoil. You've got crowds of angry people, potential for riots and unrest, and a deadly disease that doesn't care about democratic process.
The DRC is a massive country. It's 2/3rds the size of all of Western Europe and home to over 80 million people. And it's about to have a possible election crisis on top of the second largest Ebola outbreak of all time. foreignpolicy.com/2018/12/20/con… 
