Please Note: This transcript is not edited and may contain errors.

00:00:00 Operator

Good afternoon and thank you all for standing by. For the duration of today’s call all listeners are in a listen only mode until the question and answer section. At that time credentialed members of the media can press star one to ask a question or star two to withdraw a question. Today’s call is being recorded, if you have any objections please disconnect at this time. I will now introduce Mr. Benjamin Haynes. Thank you Sir. You may begin.

00:00:31 Benjamin Haynes, CDC Moderator

Thank you Brad and good afternoon everyone. I’d like to thank you all for joining us today for an update on CDC ‘s Ebola response. I know on Friday we briefly mentioned that we were aware of the outbreak and we’re responding. So today Dr. Satish Pillai will give an update and then we’ll take your questions. When we get to the question and answers,

we wanted to make sure that Dr. David Fitter is here just in case you may have some lingering hantavirus questions. I’ll now turn the call over to Dr. Pillai.

00:01:01 CAPT Satish K. Pillai, MD, MPH, CDC Ebola Response Incident Manager

Thank you Ben and thank you all for joining us on a Sunday afternoon. As mentioned earlier in the week, CDC is responding to an outbreak of Ebola disease in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda. In DRC this outbreak has now affected at least 9 health zones; there have also been 2 confirmed cases identified in Uganda in people who traveled there from DRC. Yesterday, the World Health Organization declared this outbreak a public health emergency of international concern, or a PHEIC. There are 4 types of Ebola virus that cause illness in people. This specific outbreak is caused by the Bundibugyo virus subtype of Ebola.

CDC is urgently coordinating with our interagency partners on this outbreak to ensure the outbreak is managed and prevent further spread of Ebola. CDC has activated our Emergency Response Center for this outbreak. And through our CDC country office in DRC and Uganda, we are providing in country support for surveillance, contact tracing, laboratory testing, infection prevention and control, border health activities, and community engagement.

We’re also mobilizing additional support from our headquarters in Atlanta. Friday, we posted 2 travel health notices for DRC and Uganda and yesterday CDC posted a situation update on our website.

At present, there are no FDA approved vaccines or therapeutics for Ebola virus Bundibugyo. And proactive supportive care including fluid and electrolyte management and treatment of complications is the most effective strategy for optimizing patient outcomes.

This is the 18th recorded Ebola outbreak in DRC since the virus was first identified in 1976. The previous Ebola outbreak in DRC ended December 2025. There have only been a few Bundibugyo species outbreaks before this one, one in Uganda in 2007, one DRC in 2015.

To the American public, the risk to the United States remains low.

Travelers to the region should avoid contact with sick people, report symptoms immediately and follow our travel health guidance.

Thank you.

00:03:50 Mr. Haynes

Thank you Dr. Pillai; Brad we are ready to take questions.

00:04:11 Operator

Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer session. If you are a credentialed member of the media and would like to ask a question during the call, press star one on your touch tone phone. Press star 2 to withdraw your question. You may queue up at anytime. The first question for today will come from Helen Branswell of STAT your line is open.

00:04:36 Helen Branswell

Thank you very much for doing this and thank you very much for taking my question. Dr. Pillai, I’m hearing reports that there have been some exposures of Americans in DRC, I think about 6, I think 2 or 3 of those people may have had high risk exposures and that one may be symptomatic now and that the United states may be looking to either repatriate those people, at least get them somewhere where they could be monitored and cared for. Can you please tell us about that?

00:05:17 Dr. Pillai

Thank you Helen for the question. The CDC headquarters and the CDC country office is actively working with our interagency partners, the embassy to fully assess the situation and the needs on the ground. It is a highly dynamic situation, and at this point what I would say is we continue to assess. We will continue to keep you posted as we learn more and thank you.

00:05:50 Helen Branswell

I’m sorry that didn’t answer my question.

00:05:54 Dr. Pillai

Yeah, I would say again we are assessing the needs on the ground, the situation, and working with our interagency partners and we will continue to keep individuals posted as we learn more.

00:06:10 Mr. Haynes

Next question please.

00:06:16 Operator

The next question comes from Mike Stobbe of The Associated Press, your line is open.

00:06:22 Mike Stobbe

Hi thank you for taking my question, a couple, first a follow up from Helen Branswell, I don’t understand, are you saying that there are Americans who are being assessed and were exposed? I mean, that’s the, I know this administration is striving for transparency, so could you please answer the question directly? Also, could you say how many people CDC has in its office in the DRC, how many people it has in Uganda, and how many people more, how many more people you’re sending, thank you?

00:06:56 Dr. Pillai

Thank you, so I will say we don’t discuss or comment on individual dispositions. As the US government has additional information to share, we will continue to share. Regarding the second question, the DRC country office has over 30 individuals. We are identifying deployers to head out early this week and will continue to identify what the needs are and deployment requests against that and similarly the Uganda country office has requested deployers and we’re actively moving to get people into the field.

00:07:36 Mr. Haynes

Next question please.

00:07:39 Operator

The next question will come from Youri Benadjaoud of ABC News, your line is open.

00:07:46 Youri Benadjaoud

Thanks for taking this call guys. How concerned are you that this outbreak is going to continue to grow ,especially given the fact that there’s no vaccines and treatments? Are you aware of anyone that’s already taking an international flight?

00:08:02 Dr. Pillai

Regarding the issue of no therapeutics, I do want to emphasize the fact that we have known ways to control Ebola outbreaks through contact tracing, active case identification, early testing, quarantine and isolation measures, those have been proven effective and those are the measures to undertake with Bundibugyo outbreaks and those are the measures that we’re going to be emphasizing in this outbreak.

00:08:40 Mr. Haynes

Next, sorry Youri, go ahead.

00:08:44 Youri Benadjaoud

On the international flights, do you know of any cases or exposures that have taken an international flight so far?

00:08:53 Dr. Pillai

I can’t speak to that, I’m not aware of any, and I would say that we have measures in the US that, for exit screening in countries as well as and have provided ongoing support on border health activities with our country offices and the ministries of health.

00:09:19 Mr. Haynes

Next question please Brad.

00:09:23 Operator

The next question comes from Jonathan Lambert of NPR your line is open.

00:09:29 Jonathan Lambert

Hi thanks for taking my question. I wonder if you could speak to why it took so long for the outbreak to become recognized as Ebola. Was CDC involved in supporting the transfer or testing of samples in the early days of the outbreaks and did aid cuts affect these surveillance programs?

00:09:50 Dr. Pillai

CDC was notified of the DRC outbreak, of the confirmed case on Thursday evening and Uganda Friday, directly from our ongoing relationships with the Ministry of Health. As soon as we learned of the activity we began mobilizing efforts at headquarters. The location in Bunia is a challenging area with really, concerns and challenges with I think public health practice. As soon as the outbreak was identified we have been actively mobilizing.

00:10:41 Mr. Haynes

Next question please Brad.

00:10:44 Operator

The next question will come from Lynne Peterson with Trends in Medicine, your line is open.

00:10:51 Lynne Peterson

Thank you, I guess I’ll add to the list of people asking, are any Americans infected in the DRC? We’re not asking you to tell us who they are, but we would like to know if there are any Americans involved. That’s the first part of my question. Do we have an answer to that?

00:11:12 Dr. Pillai

I will say again at this juncture we’re actively assessing the situation on the ground, and we aren’t going to comment on individual dispositions of infection, exposure.

00:11:28 Lynne Peterson

And secondly, in respect to travel, is it actually safe to let anybody fly out of those countries right now? Because there’s no test? We’re not testing everybody that flies and they could be asymptomatic. So should there not be, are you considering a complete travel ban out of the countries?

00:11:54 Dr. Pillai

So there is diagnostic capabilities for Bundibugyo. That’s how these cases were identified both in Uganda and DRC. The biology of Bundibugyo virus is such that individuals are infectious only if they’re symptomatic. And we have exit screening activities in both DRC and Uganda, in discussions with our embassies and our country offices.

00:12:27 Mr. Haynes

Brad we have time for 2 more questions.

00:12:31 Operator

Thank you, the next question comes from Nadia Kounang of CNN, your line is open.

00:12:39 Nadia Kounang

Hi thanks for taking our questions. I wanted to follow up on the traveler situation. You mentioned there’s exit screening activities both in DRC and Uganda. One: can you clarify or expand on what those exit screening strategies are, and secondly is there further discussion then about monitoring travelers who have come from those areas to the United States and monitoring them for symptoms?

00:13:07 Dr. Pillai

So with, I think one important point is both Uganda and DRC are experienced with viral hemorrhagic fever outbreaks, Ebola outbreaks. The role of exit screening is appropriate symptom monitoring and assessing from signs and symptoms. Both countries have experience in implementing these. And again, even as of a few hours ago, we were in discussions with our country office partners about this, and we will continue to reinforce those practices. And on the ports of entry, the US has appropriate, is putting in appropriate measures for identifying individuals with any symptoms.

00:13:59 Mr. Haynes

And our last question please.

00:14:03 Operator

Yes, your last question will come from George Solis of NBC News, your line is open.

00:14:09 George Solis

Hi thank you so much for doing this. I know we can’t talk about the, any cases specifically related to Americans, but just generally speaking, how concerned do Americans or the American public need to be about these cases, and how soon would you get a sense of just the number of cases before this could become a pandemic style emergency?

00:14:32 Dr. Pillai

So I think to start, the risk to Americans is low. I think this is different than a respiratory transmissible disease such as COVID. Individuals are at risk of transmitting infection when they’re symptomatic, there is not an asymptomatic phase, and therefore again going back to the idea of being able to identify individuals, appropriately triage individuals, test, either quarantine or isolate appropriately, and provide supportive care are the critical public health interventions. So again, that that speaks to the fact that this is different than a respiratory transmissible infectious disease, and the risk to the American people is low.

00:15:31 Mr. Haynes

Thank you Dr. Pillai and thank you all for joining us today. A transcript and audio file of this call will be posted to the CDC media site later today, and this will conclude our call, thank you.

00:15:44 Operator

Thank you all for your participation and for joining today’s conference. You may now all disconnect.