Ebola's Deadliest Speed: Congo vs. History

connectrealdots.com THU, OCT 8, 2026

DEATHS IN CURRENT OUTBREAK

1,000+

Congo 2025–2026, fastest milestone ever reached

TOTAL DEATHS, 2014–2016 EPIDEMIC

11,310

West Africa — Guinea, Sierra Leone, Liberia

SPEED DIFFERENTIAL

~3×

faster to 1,000 deaths than the 2014–2016 West Africa epidemic

VACCINE DISRUPTED BY CONFLICT

rVSV-ZEBOV

Ervebo — proven effective in 2018–2020 Kivu; cold chain broken in 2025–2026

Cumulative deaths by day since outbreak declared

Hover event markers to see what drove each inflection point. The Congo 2025–2026 curve clears 1,000 deaths nearly three times faster than West Africa did.

2014–2016 West Africa

2025–2026 Congo (current)

Key event (hover)

← Days since outbreak declaredCumulative confirmed deaths →

Reader Q&AThe questions every reader has — answered

~3×

Speed differential

Congo 2025–2026 reached 1,000 confirmed deaths nearly three times faster than the 2014–2016 West Africa epidemic — the largest Ebola outbreak ever recorded. The difference is not the virus. It is the context around it.

Vaccine note

rVSV-ZEBOV (Ervebo) proved highly effective during the 2018–2020 Kivu outbreak in the same region. In 2025–2026, the same vaccine is available but cannot be consistently delivered — militia control of logistics routes repeatedly disrupts the refrigeration required to maintain efficacy. The bottleneck is access, not science.