The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) expects to diagnose ‘Disease X’, which has killed at least 79 people in the Panzi district of Kwango Province by the weekend, according to the country’s Director-General of Health, Dr Dieudonné Mwamba.

“The disease is characterised by fever, headaches, cough and sometimes difficulty breathing,” Mwamba told a media briefing hosted by Africa’s Centre for Disease Control and Prevention on Thursday. 

So far, around 376 people have been infected and the disease appears to be airborne, he added. Females are slightly more affected than males, and the majority of cases (52%) are under the age of 5. The second biggest group of patients is people aged over 25 (almost 30%).

“Given that we do not have a specific diagnosis, we don’t know whether we are faced with a viral or bacterial disease, but we believe that, in under 48 hours, the results of the laboratories will help us,” he said.

However, he noted that people in the impoverished rural Panzi district were “vulnerable” as there is a malnutrition rate of almost 40%, it recently experienced a serious typhoid outbreak. The DRC is also experiencing a seasonal influenza outbreak.

Panzi does not have the capacity to test the specimens taken from patients with the unknown disease, so they have been sent to a laboratory in Kikwit some 500km away.

The first case of the unknown illness was identified on 24 October in the largely rural south-eastern province bordering Angola. However, central authorities were only notified of a possible outbreak on 1 December, according to Dr Jean Kaseya, Africa CDC Director-General, who addressed the briefing from the DRC.

“We want to reinforce the surveillance. We have a delay of almost five to six weeks, and in [that time], so many things can happen. This is why we are supporting the country to build strong capacity for surveillance,” said Kaseya.

A team from Africa CDC, including an epidemiologist and laboratory and infection prevention control (IPC) experts, is being sent to Panzi on Friday to assist officials, he added.

Mpox continues to spread

Meanwhile, Mpox continues to spread, particularly in Central Africa, with 2,700 new cases in the past week, up from 2,618 new cases the previous week,  said Kaseya.

The outbreak has affected 20 African countries. After laboratory testing, Zambia and Zimbabwe have confirmed that their outbreaks are Clade 1b.

“In total, we have 62,171 cases. Last week, we lost 36 people, and that brings a total of 1200 deaths since January 2024,” said Kaseya.

However, only 13, 579 of the cases have been clinically confirmed as laboratory testing remains a challenge in many areas.

The DRC remains the worst affected by mpox, with both clade 1a and 1b circulating. The lion’s share of the week’s new cases – 2,115 – were identified in the DRC and all 36 of the week’s deaths were in the DRC.

However, testing remains a challenge in the country, with only 20% of cases confirmed by laboratories.

Africa CDC also flagged the links between high burdens of mpox cases and measles cases in DRC, but has not yet established a causal link between the two diseases.