UN News Today 01 October 2026 |

DR Congo Ebola response hit by destruction of transit centre

The huge challenge of containing the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo – DRC – suffered a significant setback after a transit centre for patients burned down in a displacement camp in Ituri province.

UN senior Ebola response coordinator, Julien Harneis, said that the destruction of the facility at Kigonze camp would further undermine efforts to treat patients and contain the virus.

“It’s been a huge struggle to create Ebola transit centres [and] Ebola treatment centres; it’s required money, bringing in staff and it’s been a struggle all across the east. So, when we lose a centre, that means we lose capacity, we lose investment and we have to start again. And above all, it means that people do not get access to the care that they really need.”

The camp, which previously sheltered some 19,000 people displaced by violence, has been abandoned amid renewed fighting in eastern DRC.

More than 5,000 people have fled their homes in Ituri in recent days, while insecurity has disrupted patient transfers and the transport of laboratory samples.

Two people involved in the Ebola response were also reportedly killed in neighbouring North Kivu province.

Meanwhile, the World Health Organization, WHO, appealed for more health workers and treatment beds to contain the outbreak, which has spread across seven provinces of DRC.

Ukraine: Winterization efforts need to speed up, warn aid teams 

To Ukraine, where aid teams say that winterization efforts need to speed up, amid ongoing Russian attacks on energy networks across the country.

In an alert on Thursday, UN humanitarians warned that last winter, millions of people went without heating, water or essential health services for prolonged periods, while temperatures remained well below freezing. 

Populations in frontline and other areas that have come under attack recently, face particularly severe consequences, marked by repeated displacement, damaged housing and limited resilience, more than four and a half years since Russia’s full-scale invasion.

In an update, the UN health agency WHO highlighted the impact of increasing attacks on logistics and warehouse infrastructure, particularly those used to store food around Kyiv and other major distribution hubs.

Increasing disruption to electricity, heating, water supply and health services are also expected over the winter, it said.

In the first six months of 2026 in Ukraine, attacks killed nearly 1,400 civilians and injured almost 8,000. That’s 37 per cent higher than in the same period last year.

Attacks on healthcare have also seen an alarming increase so far this year, with 325 recorded attacks, causing 142 injuries and 16 deaths.

Marshall Islands nuclear legacy in Human Rights Council spotlight

The enduring radioactive legacy of US nuclear bomb testing in the Marshall Islands took centre stage at the Human Rights Council on Thursday.

Addressing the impact of 67 known tests conducted between 1946 and 1958, UN deputy rights chief Awa Dabo said that it lives on in the bodies of Marshallese people, in “lands poisoned and communities displaced” today.

Justice must be served for the people unable to return to the atolls – or coral islands – contaminated by the detonations, Ms. Dabo insisted; she also highlighted the devastating health consequences of repeated nuclear testing:

“Virtually every Marshallese family has been touched by the enduring health consequences of the nuclear testing, which include elevated rates of cancer. Marshallese women and their family members carry painful memories of miscarriages, stillbirths and severe congenital conditions.”

Today, communities affected by harmful nuclear radiation face social stigma and are called “poison people”, Ms. Dabo noted.

“Marshallese communities have the right to an effective remedy for the harm caused by the nuclear tests,” she stressed, in a call on US authorities to declassify information about data on radiation exposure and testing records.

Daniel Johnson, UN News