Uganda discharged its last confirmed Ebola patient from Mulago National Referral Hospital in Kampala on July 16, 2026. The patient, a Congolese national, was the final case in an outbreak that infected 20 people in Uganda and killed two. The discharge starts a 42-day countdown required by the World Health Organization before the country can be officially declared Ebola-free.

Under WHO guidelines, a country must pass two consecutive 21-day incubation periods — the time it takes for symptoms to appear after infection — without any new cases before an outbreak is formally declared over. Uganda's health minister, Dr. Chris Baryomsi, confirmed the discharge in an official Ministry of Health press release on the government's Ebola Virus Disease daily updates portal. The WHO Regional Office for Africa independently confirmed both the last patient's discharge and the start of the 42-day countdown.

Uganda declared its outbreak on May 15, 2026, nearly two months after closing its border with Congo around January 4, 2026 to limit the disease's spread. The broader outbreak affecting both Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo is centered in Congo's Ituri province. As of July 14, 2026, the DRC outbreak — caused by the Bundibugyo strain of the Ebola virus — had 2,073 confirmed cases and 796 deaths since the WHO declared it on May 17, 2026.

Uganda's 20 confirmed infections included 15 Congolese nationals, four health workers, and one driver. The case fatality rate was less than 10%, among the lowest ever recorded in an Ebola outbreak. That relatively low mortality rate raises questions about the clinical treatment protocols used and how the Bundibugyo strain's viral load compares to other Ebola variants.

Because no licensed vaccine exists for the Bundibugyo strain, containment relied entirely on rapid isolation of patients, contact tracing (finding and monitoring anyone who had contact with an infected person), and cross-border surveillance rather than ring vaccination — the strategy of vaccinating everyone around a confirmed case to create a protective ring. Oxford University's Oxford Vaccine Group recently launched the world's first Phase I clinical trial of BD-Ebov, a vaccine candidate targeting the Bundibugyo strain, though it remains in early-stage testing and was not available during the outbreak.

The cross-border nature of the outbreak drew diplomatic engagement. Presidents Yoweri Museveni of Uganda and Félix Tshisekedi of DRC agreed on closer cross-border cooperation and signed a bilateral memorandum of understanding. Uganda sent health experts to DRC as part of that agreement.

Despite these efforts, 15 countries still maintain partial or full travel restrictions on Uganda. The United States imposed a travel ban on non-U.S. citizens who had been in DRC, Uganda, or South Sudan, with the CDC temporarily restricting U.S. entry. Canada banned travelers from Uganda and South Sudan for 90 days starting May 27, 2026. Uganda itself suspended all direct flights to and from DRC and restricted bus and boat border crossings during the outbreak. Africa CDC warned that travel restrictions could actually increase public health risks by pushing movement underground and pointed to what it called 'deeper structural injustice' in global health governance.

The WHO's representative in Uganda, Dr. Kasonde Mwinga, is overseeing the final surveillance period. If no new cases emerge, Uganda will complete the required 42-day countdown in late August 2026.

The broader context here is the tension between a country's right to protect its own public health and the need for international coordination during infectious disease emergencies. The fact that 15 countries still maintain travel restrictions on Uganda, even as it enters its countdown period, shows how political and economic risk decisions often lag behind the actual epidemiological timeline. For global health professionals, Uganda's experience offers a case study in managing a cross-border outbreak without a licensed vaccine, while navigating the friction between bilateral cooperation and third-party travel restrictions.