Why the response keeps falling behind Ituri province remains the epicenter and WHO's biggest concern. More than 80% of new infections are being traced outside known contact lists — meaning transmission chains are spreading undetected faster than responders can map them. About two-thirds of deaths are occurring in communities, among people who never reached a health facility at all. The response has genuinely scaled: treatment capacity now exceeds 800 beds, laboratory capacity has grown from a single lab to 16, contact follow-up has reached nearly 80%, and more than 21,000 community workers are in training. But Tedros was blunt that scale hasn't been enough — "the outbreak in DRC is continuing to outpace the response." The money isn't there The WHO–Africa CDC joint $518 million, six-month continental response plan — launched in early June — faces a funding shortfall of more than $400 million. "This is not charity. It's an investment in national security," Tedros told reporters, urging donors to close the gap. UNICEF separately warned only 25% of the funding it needs for its own Ebola response has materialized. UNICEF Regional Director Gilles Fagninou, visiting Ituri, put it plainly: "We know how to stop this epidemic. The challenge is not the lack of solutions, but the lack of funding to deploy them at the scale needed." Conflict is the other obstacle money can't fix Active armed conflict in eastern DRC is hampering access to affected areas. A treatment centre in Bunia was attacked just one day before the July 16 briefing — part of a pattern of violence against health facilities that has run through this outbreak since its early weeks. Tedros said technical fixes alone won't be enough; the response needs "political intervention" to enable the scale-up still required. The outbreak has already crossed borders On July 13, German authorities confirmed a laboratory-verified Bundibugyo case in a U.S. humanitarian worker medically evacuated from DRC — the second American case treated in Germany. Africa CDC reported that as of July 9, 112 health workers had been infected across DRC since the outbreak began, 35 of them fatally. Africa CDC Director-General Dr. Jean Kaseya has called for stronger protection of responders, whose safety Africa CDC describes as "central to stopping transmission." Uganda offers the outbreak's one genuinely encouraging data point: no new cases since June 21, with the country now in its 42-day enhanced surveillance window before the outbreak can be declared over there. _Reporting sources: WHO Director-General's opening remarks, 16 July 2026; UN News; WHO Disease Outbreak News (DON613); Council on Foreign Relations; Africa CDC (Top Africa News, 13 July 2026)._