A crowd set fire to an Ebola treatment center in Rwampara, eastern Congo, on Thursday after being stopped from retrieving a friend's body, a witness and a senior police officer said. The arson attack underscores the challenges health workers face enforcing strict burial protocols that clash with local customs. The bodies of Ebola victims are highly contagious, but grieving families often demand traditional funeral rites.
"The young people ended up setting fire to the center," said witness Alexis Burata. An AP journalist saw looters burn both objects and what appeared to be a victim's body. Aid workers fled in vehicles. The World Health Organization reports nearly 750 suspected cases and 177 suspected deaths in Congo, with confirmed cases in Uganda. Experts say the actual outbreak is likely much larger, with no vaccine or medicine yet available for the Bundibugyo strain.