Health officials in the Democratic Republican of Congo say the risk of Ebola spreading in the densely populated city of Goma is low because a patient with the killer virus was identified early.

A preacher who had arrived by bus at the regional center in Goma on Sunday had been quickly transported to an Ebola treatment center.  He had traveled 200 kilometers from Butembo, where he had been with people infected with Ebola.  

"Because of the speed with which the patient was identified and isolated, and the identification of all the other bus passengers coming from Butembo, the risk of it spreading in the rest of the city of Goma is small," read a statement from the Health Ministry.  The rest of the passengers on that bus have been tracked down.

Goma is a city of two million people near the Rwandan border, a place where a highly contagious virus like Ebola can easily spread.  But health officials had been preparing for such an event for months, and frontline health care workers have already been given one of the three Ebola vaccines being used to fight the current outbreak.

Unfortunately, some people think that the vaccines are what is making people sick - healthcare workers have also had to deal with opposition politicians spreading misinformation, and attacks from one of the armed militias running out the eastern DR Congo.

The epidemic is closing in on its anniversary.  Since being declared on 1 August 2018, there have been 1,655 fatalities out of 2,821 confirmed and suspected infections.