Ebola and Hantavirus Frame WHA79 and Cuba's Health Care Under the Blockade
May 22, 2026
Editors' Note
The seventy-ninth World Health Assembly (WHA79) convened on Monday, one day after the World Health Organization declared a public health emergency of international concern over an Ebola virus outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo that spread to Uganda. The outbreak, which involves the rare Bundibugyo species of Ebola that has no vaccines or specific treatments, was announced three days before the remaining crew aboard the MV Hondius—the center of a recent hantavirus episode—disembarked in the Netherlands.
Although those emergencies differ in scale and pathogen, Chatham House global health fellow Ebere Okereke says they recall the same moral: every region depends on functioning surveillance, transparent notification, trusted public-health institutions, and equitable access to countermeasures.
To lead this week's edition, Okereke shares a dispatch from the WHA, explaining how those outbreaks have sharpened conversations on budget constraints, benefit sharing, and institutional reform. She emphasizes that the moment calls for African governments to shape the next global-health order. The post includes a map by TGH Data Visuals Editor Allison Krugman, depicting where the Ebola outbreak is spreading.
The newsletter stays on the continent, where CFR Senior Fellow for Africa Policy Studies Michelle Gavin spotlights the tenth anniversary of UN Security Council Resolution 2286. The measure, which passed unanimously, was intended to prevent attacks against medical and humanitarian personnel as well as medical facilities. That violence is at all-time highs globally, and Sudan has become a hotbed for such destruction. Gavin interviews Yasir Elamin, an oncologist and president of the Sudanese American Physicians Association, to understand how the resolution's lack of enforcement has failed the country's hospitals, humanitarian workers, and civilians.
Next, Arachu Castro, Tulane University's Samuel Z. Stone chair of public health in Latin America, outlines how the U.S. fuel blockade on Cuba has weakened every part of the island's health system, creating a polycrisis.
To wrap up, TGH recommends recent coverage of the seventy-ninth WHA and topics covered in its agenda.
Until next week!—Nsikan Akpan, Managing Editor, and Caroline Kantis, Associate Editor
