United States pledges additional life-saving health assistance in response to Ebola outbreak

WASHINGTON, USA – On the margins of the high-level week of the 81st United Nations General Assembly in New York, the US Department of State announced an additional $267 million in direct life-saving health and humanitarian assistance for the response to the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). With this new life-saving global health assistance, the United States will directly scale up support to combat the outbreak through new Ebola treatment units, additional safe and dignified burial teams, mass procurements of personal protective equipment, expanded surveillance, critical health commodities, and contact tracing through trusted implementers.

“The US government continues to be the largest provider of health and humanitarian assistance for this outbreak. To date, the United States government has provided $887 million in direct health and humanitarian assistance to combat the Ebola outbreak. Of that $887 million, the Department of State has provided more than $780 million in direct health and humanitarian assistance. This additional $267 million fulfills the US government’s commitment at the G7 Leaders’ Summit to provide up to an additional $500 million on Ebola response efforts,” reports the US Department of State.

“The Department, in close coordination with the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and in partnership with the governments of the DRC, Uganda, and other countries in the region, is continuing to mount a rapid and comprehensive response to the Ebola outbreak. The Department activated a response plan and mobilised life-saving foreign assistance for immediate response efforts within 48 hours of the first reports of Ebola in the DRC in May 2026, the fastest US response to Ebola.”

US Department of State also announced that, through the more than $780 million being provided by the department, implementers are conducting critical Ebola response and preparedness efforts. These efforts include supplying 292 metric tons of humanitarian supplies to outbreak zones, supporting 8.6 million health screenings across affected at-risk countries, delivering 184,000 pieces of critical disease prevention equipment, operationalising 23 specialised Ebola treatment centers, supporting 235 health facilities in outbreak areas, protecting Americans at home and abroad, and supporting countries’ efforts to contain this outbreak at its source.

“This is in addition to the $350 million in critical humanitarian assistance provided to the DRC, Uganda, and South Sudan, as part of our $1.8 billion in assistance to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, announced on May 14. The Department’s response to this outbreak builds on the five-year global health Memorandum of Understanding with the DRC, signed in February through the Trump administration’s America First Global Health Strategy and decades of gains made through critical US global health assistance,” adding, “while the United States is the largest health and humanitarian provider to this outbreak, we call on capable nations to increase burden sharing to meet the urgency of the moment.”