Anxious healthcare workers in eastern Congo said yesterday that they are underprotected and undertrained as a rare type of Ebola spreads rapidly in some of the world’s most remote and vulnerable areas.

“It’s truly sad and painful because we’ve already been through a security crisis, and now Ebola is here too,” said Justin Ndasi, a resident of Bunia, site of the first known death that was announced last week after what experts call a worrying delay in detecting the virus.

The response unfolds in a region long threatened by armed groups that have kept a large part of the population on the run and control a major city where Ebola cases have been confirmed, complicating health workers’ catch-up efforts to trace the outbreak. The World Health Organization (WHO), which noted a low risk globally, has said “patient zero” has not been found.