UN News Today 22 October 2026 |

DR Congo: Ebola responders under pressure as outbreak expands

As deadly Ebola disease expands into an eighth province of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), investigators pursued all leads on Thursday to assess the risk of the disease spreading in Nigeria.

Authorities in Abuja confirmed their first case of infection in an individual arriving from Uganda, which borders the worst-hit provinces in DRC.

With more details, here’s Dr Patrick Otim, from the UN World Health Organization’s Emergency Response programme:

“The source of exposure is still not known and the travel history of the patient is being pieced together now in terms of her movement from Uganda up to Nigeria. This is rapidly evolving. As we get more information, we’ll try to determine where she was exposed. And then it’s at that point where we can say whether there is any transmission happening.”

Nigeria is the fifth country this year after DRC, France, Uganda and Kenya to confirm the presence of Ebola disease caused by Bundibugyo virus. 

The original DRC outbreak was declared in mid-May where it has led to more than 4,600 deaths and a total of 9,552 confirmed infections. 

Around six in 10 of these deaths have occurred outside health centres, indicating the continuing difficulty of halting community transmission.

UN agencies continue Ukraine aid as Russian strikes intensify

To Ukraine, where long-range Russian attacks across the country, including in Kyiv, caused at least 14 civilian deaths and 78 injuries overnight into Thursday.

Seven children were wounded in the strikes, which further damaged health and energy facilities, according to Ukrainian authorities and reports from Russian-occupied areas.

Meanwhile, UN agencies continue to support communities in frontline areas in Ukraine, where reaching them is complicated or dangerous.

On Wednesday, a UN team from the Department of Safety and Security delivered relief supplies to a community close to the contact line in #Zaporizhzhia region, where they described access as “severely constrained”. 

They delivered medicines and hygiene kits, including for older people, along with winter supplies.

Also helping with winterization efforts, the UN Children’s Fund, UNICEF, reported this week that it has supported nearly 70,000 families living on the front line with cash assistance, delivered in partnership with the Ukrainian authorities.

In Russian-occupied areas, reports also indicate that two civilians were killed and nine were injured in Donetsk oblast. 

Unlawful deaths of elderly: Overlooked and under-reported globally

Suspicious deaths of elderly people are under-reported, under-investigated and under-researched worldwide, an independent human rights expert said on Thursday, in a call to boost investigations and prevention work.

Morris Tidball-Binz, who reports to the UN Human Rights Council on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, said that ageism and other discrimination “too often lead to abuse, neglect and other causes of unlawful deaths being overlooked”. 

The Special Rapporteur maintained that “harmful age-based stereotypes depicting older persons as inevitably frail, sick and near death can normalise and depersonalise their deaths”. 

This can mean that criminal or preventable deaths are falsely reported as the result of ageing.

Sepsis can cause a natural death, but it may be the result of long-lasting abuse and neglect, Mr. Tidball-Binz noted.

In his report to the Human Rights Council, the Special Rapporteur detailed practical measures that improve respect for and protection of older persons’ right to life; these include strengthening investigative processes, data collection, institutional oversight and prevention.

Daniel Johnson, UN News