Efficiency of Field Laboratories for Ebola Virus Disease Outbreak during Chronic Insecurity, Eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, 2018–2020

During the 10th outbreak of Ebola virus disease in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Institut National de Recherche Biomédicale strategically positioned 13 decentralized field laboratories with dedicated equipment to quickly detect cases as the outbreak evolved. The laboratories were operated by national staff, who quickly handed over competencies and skills to local persons to successfully manage future outbreaks. Laboratories analyzed ≈230,000 Ebola diagnostic samples under stringent biosafety measures, documentation, and database management. Field laboratories diversified their activities (diagnosis, chemistry and hematology, survivor follow-up, and genomic sequencing) and shipped 127,993 samples from the field to a biorepository in Kinshasa under good conditions. Deploying decentralized and well-equipped laboratories run by local personnel in at-risk countries for Ebola virus disease outbreaks is an efficient response; all activities are quickly conducted in the field

Integration of genomic sequencing into the response to the Ebola virus outbreak in Nord Kivu, Democratic Republic of the Congo

International audienceOn 1 August 2018, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) declared its tenth Ebola virus disease (EVD) outbreak. To aid the epidemiologic response, the Institut National de Recherche Biomédicale (INRB) implemented an end-to-end genomic surveillance system, including sequencing, bioinformatic analysis and dissemination of genomic epidemiologic results to frontline public health workers. We report 744 new genomes sampled between 27 July 2018 and 27 April 2020 generated by this surveillance effort. Together with previously available sequence data (n = 48 genomes), these data represent almost 24% of all laboratory-confirmed Ebola virus (EBOV) infections in DRC in the period analyzed. We inferred spatiotemporal transmission dynamics from the genomic data as new sequences were generated, and disseminated the results to support epidemiologic response efforts. Here we provide an overview of how this genomic surveillance system functioned, present a full phylodynamic analysis of 792 Ebola genomes from the Nord Kivu outbreak and discuss how the genomic surveillance data informed response efforts and public health decision making