KINSHASA -- The government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) on Thursday declared a new outbreak of Ebola in the central province of Kasai, the country's 16th since 1976.

Health Minister Roger Kamba announced at a press conference in the capital of Kinshasa that the Zaire strain of the Ebola virus has re-emerged in the Bulape health zone, with 28 suspected cases reported, including 15 deaths.

"These figures remain provisional, as investigations are still ongoing," Kamba said, stressing that the announcement was guided by transparency and scientific rigor.

According to an early statement by the Ministry of Health, the index case was a 34-year-old pregnant woman admitted to Bulape General Reference Hospital on Aug. 20 with symptoms of sudden fever, multiple hemorrhages, bloody vomiting, and severe fatigue. She died on Aug 25 from multiple organ failure.

The DRC last declared the end of an Ebola outbreak in September 2022, after one case was confirmed in the eastern province of North Kivu. Testing showed that the case was genetically linked to the 2018-2020 outbreak in North Kivu and Ituri provinces, which killed nearly 2,300 people.

Ebola disease first occurred in 1976 in two simultaneous outbreaks: one outbreak was of Sudan virus disease in Nzara in what is now South Sudan, and the other outbreak was of Ebola virus disease in Yambuku, in what is now the DRC, then known as Zaire. The latter occurred in a village near the Ebola River, from which the disease takes its name, according to the World Health Organization.

Ebola is a highly contagious hemorrhagic fever that causes a range of symptoms such as fever, vomiting, diarrhea, generalized pain, or malaise, and in many cases, internal and external bleeding.