Kenya detects 9th Ebola case

Kenya Red Cross warehouse personnel inspect a burial bag that is part of batches of medical kits due for deployment as efforts to contain rising cases of Ebola ramp up in the Kenyan capital Nairobi on October 19, 2026. Photo by Tony KARUMBA / AFP.

Kenyan authorities have detected a ninth case of Ebola in the country, the health ministry said Tuesday.

The east African country reported its first Ebola case on October 6 – a businessman in his forties who had lived in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), where there has been a major outbreak since May.

Since the first, eight additional cases have emerged, mostly people with a close connection to the first victim, who died in the capital Nairobi on October 5.

The ninth case is a 24-year-old man, described as “a close family member of the first case” by the ministry, and confirmed positive on Monday.

“He was isolated at the first sign of illness, tested and started on treatment immediately upon confirmation of his positive test result,” it said, adding he “was already in quarantine when he fell ill”.

“All nine cases belong to one cluster, and as (of) today there is no evidence of transmission outside this group,” it added.

In the statement, the ministry said that contact tracing widened with each fresh case, and that 134 of 135 contacts have been traced and quarantined.

It comes as the United States asked its citizens to reconsider travel to Kenya, raising its travel advisory “due to health risks”.

In the DRC, the epidemic has surpassed 9,000 cases, with 4,381 deaths, according to Congolese health authorities.