Inside Ebola country: NPR reports from eastern DR Congo's outbreak zone

"There's fear," says Kasongo, "people are dying every day."

On the day we arrived in the city, a sick man on a motorbike taxi vomited blood on his driver in the center of the city, and then died on the spot. Specialist teams came to retrieve the body and decontaminate the roadside, while his family members stood around and wept.

The driver fled the scene, according to witnesses. The incident underscores the difficulties health workers face in tracking down suspected cases — one of the most critical steps in stopping the spread of the disease.

Only 56% of contacts have been traced so far across the three Congolese provinces with active Ebola transmission, according to the Congolese health ministry. The task is particularly difficult in an environment where armed groups operate, roads are mostly unpaved, and towns and cities are densely populated.

The Democratic Republic of the Congo, despite its vast reserves of copper and cobalt, remains one of the world's poorest countries. According to the World Bank, more than 85% of the population survives on about $3 a day.

Ituri, like much of eastern Congo, has also been devastated by decades of armed conflict. Its health system is severely underfunded. It is now coming under even more severe strain.

In a Bunia hospital called Clinique Universelle, a decontamination team spent the weekend scrubbing walls with chlorine solution. Several days prior, a patient at the hospital had tested positive for Ebola. The hospital then shut down.

The hospital director, Patient Mazirane, said that he and his colleagues had been working without personal protective equipment (PPE). Aid organizations have airlifted hundreds of metric tons of medicines and PPE to Ituri, but it's still not enough. Many items, such as protective gloves, have to be changed regularly.

Dr. Mazirane, 38, said he wanted to leave the medical profession: if he dies, no one will look after his children. He says that several medical workers had already died.

"We're not afraid, we're very afraid," he said.