Dr. Congo Struggle: 500 MPOX patients run away from clinics after rebel looting

Amid the current conflict, more than 500 MPOX patients have fled the clinic in the Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo in the last month.

Officials of a major health agency on the Africa Center for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC), the continent have been concerned that missing patients have risk spreading highly infectious disease that is suspected of killing 900 people in DR Congo last year.

Patients fled from facilities in Goma and Buvu – two cities that were seized by Rwanda -assigned M3 rebels in the last weeks.

In -charge of a clinic of Goma, Dr. Samuel Muhindo told the BBC, “We were robbed. We lost the equipment. It was a disaster.”

MPOX – first known as monkepox – can cause symptoms such as wounds, headaches, and fever.

According to Africa CDC, since the beginning of this year, about 2,890 MPOX cases and 180 deaths have been reported in the country, which have been on the subscription of many recent outbreaks.

Dr. Muhindo told how 128 patients fled from Mugunga Health Center in Goma in the end of January.

He said that his health workers could not trace him as the paperwork in the clinic was destroyed.

In Bisengimana, a hospital in GOMA that also treats MPOX, robbers took medicines and personal safety equipment.

The fire was lit outside the center and when the criminals departed, the medical records of the patients were released on the floor.

The M3’s decision to shut down a network of camps in Goma has further complicated the situation where thousands of people who sought refuge in fighting in recent years.

they were given 72 hours to leave last weekHowever, M23 later stated that it was encouraging “voluntary returns”.

“Now we are afraid of the outbreak of epidemic in areas where the displaced people returned,” Dr. The Muhindo said.

His fear has been echoed by the Africa CDC.

The MPOX of the MPOX of CDC, Africa, Dr. Dr. Nagashi Angongo said on Thursday, “Once again, we are really calling for the ceasefire and the agency for the installation of a human corridor to facilitate the continuity of MPOX interventions.”

In the last week, the Africa CDC says the number of missing MPX patients has increased from 100 as escalats fight and rebels take more areas.

Dr. Nangongo said that Dr. A new version of MPOX was also found in the Congo with “high capacity for high capacity”.

The country’s capacity to respond to the disease is M33 and Dr. The congregation has been interrupted by the conflict amid lack of funding along with the congregation.

The MPX facility in Mugunga funded by the United Nations Children’s Agency (UNICEF) and UK Ed Direct managed to reopen last week.

But this is already so high that there are times when four or five patients have to share a bed.

“I first ran away from Minova for Goma, when the M23 rebels proceeded from the BBC,” Sadirani Bichichi Aristide, a 23 -year -old, was being treated with two of his children in Mugunga, told the BBC. “

“I started falling ill in one (camp for displaced people). It started with my fingers, and then I had wounds that started breaking on my hands. My neighbors asked me to go to Muganga with my children. I left my wife behind.”

He said that he had seen “so many people” with Mpox before reaching the clinic last week.

Goma Health Specialist of UNICEF Dr. Ohmani Rufi told the BBC that the Muganga Hospital had made only this reason, as the employees managed to hide some equipment and medicine from the robbery.

But this was not a case at many other treatment centers that had completely vandalized, he said.