Ebola vaccine don land for Democratic Republic of the Congo after months wey people don wait, many people don die and the outbreak don spread for plenty provinces. E be small reason to hope.

DRC don receive 70,000 doses of Ervebo. From those, 50,000 na for frontline health workers, while 20,000 dem reserve for trial to find out whether the vaccine really dey work against the strain wey dey cause this outbreak.

By mid-September, pass 3,000 frontline workers don vaccinate — na those wey dey put demself for most risk just by showing up to work.

But then the harder question show face.

Na wetin exactly don land?

This outbreak na Bundibugyo virus cause, no be the Zaire strain wey people sabi and wey existing vaccines dem develop for. Ervebo, the only licensed Ebola vaccine, dem build and test am for Zaire. E still uncertain whether e fit protect people against Bundibugyo.

And the numbers still dey get worse.

As of 6 October, 8,728 people don confirm sick for DRC. From those, 4,205 don die. Na almost one for two people.

The outbreak don spread across seven provinces and 64 health zones.

The virus dey move faster than the vaccine. E don always be like that.

The outbreak don carry regional and international dimension. Uganda get outbreak earlier for 2026 wey dem declare finish in August. France too report one case wey connect to the outbreak.

On 6 October, Kenya confirm im first imported case of Bundibugyo Ebola — na Kenyan citizen wey travel come from DRC through Uganda.

Why e take so long for the vaccine to reach? Why dem never develop vaccine wey specially target this strain? And why the outbreak dey so hard to contain?

WHO don still warn about funding gap. Appeals for emergency resources never full fill, so health workers dey respond to rapidly spreading outbreak without all the support wey dem need.

WHO believe say the virus don dey circulate for Ituri province as early as late January, almost four months before dem officially declare outbreak on 15 May and classify am as public health emergency two days later. By the time dem begin mobilise response, the virus don already get head start wey e no give back.

No market for the vaccine

Part of the delay get scientific explanation. The rest get to do with wetin the global health system dey choose to prepare for, and when dem choose am.

Until recently, evidence no reach to talk say Ervebo fit protect people against Bundibugyo at all.

Na only after animal studies show possible cross-protection that WHO advisers recommend make dem test am for clinical trial.

Dem wait reach August before dem even recommend trial. By that time the virus don dey kill people for months. Nobody get Bundibugyo vaccine ready. Because market no dey for am.

Na wetin the global health system dey keep do: dem dey prepare for diseases wey threaten people wey fit pay, and leave everybody else to wait. Similar thing happen with the Zaire strain.

Even though vaccine candidate dey as early as 2005, safety trials dem keep postpone, and na only the emergency of the 2014 West Africa epidemic push dem complete am almost one decade later.

We still see the same kind delay with Ebola Sudan for Uganda in 2022.

Where this actually started

Ebola no just come from nowhere. Eastern Congo sit for area wey get some of the most valuable mineral wealth for the planet — cobalt, coltan, gold, copper — and every year billions of dollars dey enter mining, logging and industrial agriculture for there.

Dem dey clear forest for pits, for timber, for plantations wey dey feed export markets wey far away thousands of kilometres. No single company come plan to cause epidemic.

But every hectare of cleared forest dey push fruit bats and other wildlife wey fit carry Ebola closer to villages and mining camps where people dey live.

Scientists don dey talk for years say habitat destruction and the appearance of new diseases get connection.

E no be coincidence say outbreaks like this one dey start for the same areas wey dem don extract and hollow out. The money wey tear those forests down no ever slow down to ask wetin e fit bring.

Then the virus jam health system wey decades of war don wear down reach almost nothing. Contact tracing, isolation wards, safe burials, early treatment — all these depend on infrastructure wey eastern Congo don struggle to hold together through one conflict after another.

Who gets to live

Congolese people no dey die because dem get bad luck. Their deaths dey happen inside structural conditions wey build up from years of conflict, environmental degradation and lack of steady investment for public health.

Cameroonian historian and political theorist Achille Mbembe call this necropolitics — the power to decide who go live and who dem go leave to die.

For eastern Congo, that power show for where hospitals dem build, which communities dem protect, and whose suffering finally count as emergency wey the world go attention to.

Nobody sign order for death but e just dey happen through the same failures, wey dem repeat so many times say e no dey look like accident again but like pattern.

Underneath everything, one plain, ugly imbalance dey. Money dey move quick go the mineral-rich Congo. E dey flow into mines, timber concessions and plantations, often within months after deal sign. But e no dey move like that into clinics, laboratories or vaccines.

International attention show up when virus dey threaten the kind of countries wey deaths from there go make headlines.

The communities wey the outbreaks actually start for dey wait far longer, and by the time help reach, thousands don already bury. That one no be global health security. Na system wey protect some lives and count others as acceptable loss.

Global health security dey mean the same thing again and again: keep am over there. But e no dey over there. E no ever been over there.

The author, Sare Şanlı, na commentator wey specialise for African politics and global power relations for the continent.

Disclaimer: The views wey the author express no necessarily reflect the opinions, viewpoints and editorial policy of TRT Afrika.