This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

Rwanda’s government briefly closed and then reopened part of a busy land border with the Democratic Republic of the Congo on Thursday, prompting panic and confusion in both countries.

The temporary closure came the day after a second Ebola-related death was confirmed in the densely populated Congolese border city of Goma.

Dr Aruna Abedi, the coordinator of the Ebola response North Kivu province, said the dead man’s wife and one-year-old daughter had also tested positive for the virus.

The Gisenyi-Goma border is used daily by hundreds of people who work and live on either side. Goma, which has a population of 2 million, is used as a transit hub for access to east Africa.

News of the border closure – which lasted less than a day – caused the price of fruit and vegetables to surge in border towns and provoked panic among those who cross the border for work.

“As residents at the border, yes, we are concerned about Ebola. Trading with DRC is [a] priority because we need to feed our families,” said Eugene Barore, a fruit seller in Rwanda.

On Thursday morning, Rwanda’s foreign minister, Olivier Nduhungirehe, told the Guardian that the border between the two countries was closed. In the afternoon, the ministry of health said reports of a border closure were the result of a “traffic slow-down” caused by heightened health checks.

“We are only telling our people to be on alert, to take precaution. The border will remain open,” Diane Gashumba, Rwanda’s health minister, told reporters in the capital of Kigali. “When there is [an] epidemic like Ebola, inaccurate information will be spread. They have said before that there are Ebola cases in Rwanda, which is not true.”

Rwandans and Congolese on both sides of the border rely on the open crossing for trade and business. Many have family on both sides. Reports of Ebola-related deaths in Goma are a cause of concern in neighbouring Rwanda.

Quick guide Ebola in the Democratic Republic of the Congo Show Hide How bad is the current outbreak? With more than 2,577 confirmed cases and more than 1,803 confirmed deaths, the outbreak in the eastern DRC is the second largest in history. It has a 67% fatality rate and 11 months after it began, the case numbers are still escalating. It is disproportionately affecting women (55% of cases) and children (28%). The WHO declared the outbreak an international public health emergency in July 2019. The same month saw the the first diagnosis of a case in Goma, a city of 2 million people, which is a transport hub on the border with Rwanda. In early August Rwanda announced that it was closing its border with DRC. The WHO has long said that the national and regional risk levels are very high and containment of the spread to North Kivu and Ituri provinces was unlikely, unless a break in the fighting made it safe for health workers. What is Ebola and how do you treat it? Ebola hemorrhagic fever is caused by a virus that has a reservoir among forest animals, including monkeys and bats. It is spread through body fluids, which is why carers – mostly female relatives and nursing staff – are particularly at risk. It causes fever, aches and diarrhoea and attacks the immune system, causing blood clotting cells to malfunction so that victims bleed extensively and die if their immune system cannot fight off the viral infection. Drugs are still experimental. Patients are isolated and treated by nurses wearing full protective body suits and masks who try to boost their immune response. Friends and relatives are quarantined for 21 days. Prevention measures include washing hands at every opportunity and safe burial practices, with no touching or washing of the body, as is traditional in some cultures. How does this compare with other outbreaks? The 2013 and 2016 outbreak in Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea spread for months through forest regions in west Africa where Ebola was unknown before the emergency was recognised. It escalated when it emerged in towns and cities, with 28,600 cases and 11,300 deaths. DRC successfully stamped out nine previous Ebola outbreaks in rural areas within a matter of a few months. Aid agencies, infectious disease experts and the WHO say it will be very hard to bring this outbreak under control, even though they have had vaccines and experimental drugs from the outset. What are the contributing factors to this outbreak? There is almost no functioning state in much of eastern DRC. There is an almost total lack of basic services such as power, education, roads, healthcare, and the authority of the government only extends to the edges of urban areas. Police are corrupt, predatory and violent. In rural zones, militia and armed bands provide security and employment opportunities but also steal, rape and kill at will. It is one of the most hostile environments faced by aid and health workers anywhere in the world. Mistrust of officials and foreigners is harming efforts to tackle the disease and conspiracy theories are rampant. Some believe the outbreak is fake news spread by rapacious NGOs and the UN to justify their presence in the country and allow the extraction of valuable mineral resources. Sarah Boseley and Jason Burke

The Rwandan government faced intense pressure from international agencies to keep the border open, the Guardian learned.

In July, the World Health Organization declared the Ebola outbreak in DRC an international public health emergency. But in an accompanying statement, the organisation also called on countries to keep their borders open.

“No country should close its borders or place any restrictions on travel and trade. Such measures are usually implemented out of fear and have no basis in science,” the statement said.

Tamba Emmanuel Danmbisaa, Oxfam’s humanitarian programme manager in the DRC, said on Thursday morning that the flow of movement at the Gisenyi-Goma border was restricted. “People were not denied exit, but were denied re-entry into Rwanda,” he said.

Danmbisaa said a border closure at Gisenyi would have a huge impact on cross-country trade and disrupt aid agencies working to contain Ebola and respond to other humanitarian crises in DRC.

Ebola in the DRC: everything you need to know Read more

For security reasons, staff from Oxfam and other aid organisations are contractually obliged to live in Gisenyi, which is considered safer than Goma, Danmbisaa said.

He warned closing the border would disrupt aid agencies’ ability to participate in the Ebola response effort in DRC. “Any restriction is likely to have an adverse effect, not only on Ebola, but on the wider humanitarian crisis in the DRC.”

Emanuele Capobianco, director of health and care at the International Federation of the Red Cross, said that closing borders could exacerbate the crisis.

“Our main concern is that shutting down the border can contribute to the virus spreading because it pushes people to use unofficial crossings and hide their connection to DRC,” he said.

A statement from Rwanda’s health ministry highlighted the country’s preparedness for an Ebola outbreakt.

The government has vaccinated 3,000 health workers in high-risk areas as a preventative measure, and has trained more than 23,957 public health workers to respond to a crisis, it said. It also has a fleet of specialist ambulances, and 23 hospitals in priority districts have prepared special isolation centres for Ebola patients.