France has reported its first case of Ebola during the latest outbreak after a doctor returning from the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) tested positive.
The doctor had returned from a humanitarian mission, the French health ministry said.
The patient is isolating for 21 days at home and authorities are contact tracing, the ministry said, adding that the risk to the general European population is low.
A hospital transfer was carried out under secure conditions to prevent any risk of contamination, even though the patient is in a stable condition .
"An in-depth epidemiological investigation is underway to identify individuals who may have been in contact with the patient," the ministry said.
The DRC's Ebola outbreak has had the largest number of confirmed cases within the first month of any episode of the disease, the World Health Organisation (WHO) said.
The number of confirmed cases in the DRC has increased to 1,094, including 277 deaths, the Congolese health ministry said on Wednesday.
The current outbreak is caused by the Bundibugyo virus. It was detected late and experts say the virus had already been circulating for months before the outbreak was officially declared on 15 May.
Contact tracing remains a key issue for local authorities, who have only achieved a 55% coverage rate, the DRC's health ministry said on Sunday.
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WHO's Abdirahman Mahamud told a press briefing in Geneva that part of the reason for the scale of the outbreak was that some early confirmed cases were in urban centres, such as Bunia and the mining town of Mongbwalu.
In the past, outbreaks have often first been identified in rural areas, fading out quickly.
"What is important is we need to scale up and this outbreak is moving faster than us," he told reporters, after returning from Bunia last week.
The two previous biggest Ebola outbreaks were one in West Africa - spanning Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia - which killed 11,325 people between 2014 and 2016, and another in the DRC in 2018, which killed 2,299 people.
A US citizen treated for Ebola in Germany was discharged earlier this month after no virus had been detected in the patient since 30 May.
(c) Sky News 2026: France reports first Ebola case after doctor returning from DR Congo tests positive
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