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2nd American infected with Ebola in DRC evacuated to Germany, WHO chief says

Medical workers disinfect a facility used to treat an Ebola patient at the Heal Africa Hospital on June 4, 2026 in Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo. (Daniel Buuma/Getty Images)

(NEW YORK) — A second American citizen infected with Ebola in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has been transferred to Germany for care, the head of the World Health Organization said on Monday.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced over the weekend that the unnamed patient works for a humanitarian aid organization and tested positive for the Bundibugyo virus, the strain of Ebola that is behind the DRC’s outbreak.

In a post on X on Monday, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director-general of the WHO, said the organization “has provided clinical care and close monitoring” for the patient in the Ituri province, where most of the DRC’s cases have been confirmed.

Samaritan’s Purse, which has been responding to the outbreak, confirmed on Monday that one of their staff members is the infected patient.

“We can confirm that one of our Samaritan’s Purse staff members working in Bunia, Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), has tested positive for the Ebola virus,” Franklin Graham, president and CEO of Samaritan’s Purse, said in a statement. “This respected and faithful staff member has been a part of our Disaster Assistance Response Team for 15 years and has been serving in a logistics capacity in the DRC over the past month. He was not involved in direct patient care at our two Ebola Treatment Centers.”

Samaritan’s Purse said it immediately contacted the CDC, the State Department and the DRC’s government upon learning of the positive test and that the organization has begun contact tracing.

The first American infected with Ebola was a doctor who contracted the disease while treating patients in the DRC. Dr. Peter Stafford was evacuated to Germany at the time to receive specialty care and was hospitalized at Charité University Hospital in Berlin, according to Serge, the international Christian missionary group that employs him.

His wife, Dr. Rebekah Stafford, and their four children were also evacuated to Germany and moved into a separate space at the hospital as high-risk contacts. Peter Stafford was discharged from the hospital in June, and the family has since returned to the United States.

The outbreak in the DRC has led to more than 1,900 cases and more than 700 deaths, according to the latest figures from the DRC’s Ministry of Health.

“As infections among response personnel are not unexpected in an outbreak of this scale, protecting frontline responders must remain a top priority,” the WHO’s Tedros wrote on X. “We are deeply grateful for the courage and commitment of all health workers working to end this outbreak.”

Copyright © 2026, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

Trump is threatening new Canadian auto tariffs. That will hurt US automakers and workers

By CNN
(CNN) — President Donald Trump’s threat of 50% auto tariffs on all imports from Canada is just the latest action to rattle an industry that’s endured shifting trade rules since he returned to office.Trump issued the auto tariff plans early Monday, just as trade tensions between the two neighbors ratcheted up. On Saturday, the US slapped 50% tariffs on a much more limited group of Canadian exports after efforts to strike a deal collapsed.But the steep auto tariffs, if enacted, could disrupt long-established business practices and have far-reaching consequences across the auto industry, experts say.“Sweaters, honey and hockey sticks are not a trade war. What the president just threatened this morning is a trade war,” said Patrick Anderson, CEO of Anderson Economic Group, a Michigan-based consulting firm. “It would be a body blow to the auto industry. We would see plants closing on both sides of the border.”Canada does have a large trade surplus with the United States. But when it comes to the auto industry, it’s the opposite — the US has a nearly $1 billion a month trade surplus with Canada.America imported $24.5 billion worth of Canadian vehicles and auto parts in the first six months of this year, according to Commerce Department trade data, compared to the $30.4 billion Canada imported.Since the North American Free Trade Agreement was first introduced in the 90s, and then the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement during Trump’s first term, the auto industry has been able to operate as if North America is a single market. Companies move parts and vehicles freely across borders, often multiple times before the car is assembled and sent to dealer showrooms.Even with last year’s auto tariffs, that process continued. That’s because carve outs allowed Canadian-made parts and vehicles to remain more or less tariff free.Disrupting that flow will cost US jobs, both for the auto parts industry and at assembly plants.“The impact of unworkable tariffs would be felt well beyond Canadian assembly plants,” said Erin Keating, executive analyst with Cox Automotive.Cars built at Canadian plants depend heavily on parts from US suppliers, which employs more than half a million Americans.And Canadians bought about 663,000 cars built at US assembly plants last year, according to research firm Mobility Global. Canadian buyers also spent more than three times as much on larger, more expensive vehicles — heavy trucks, buses and special purpose vehicles — than American buyers.Most major automakers contacted by CNN either had no comment on the tariffs or did not respond to a request for comment.Unifor, the union that represents Canadian auto workers, blasted the planned tariffs, calling them an “intimidation tactic.”“The US administration fails to recognize that our highly integrated auto industry means ongoing instability hurts workers on both sides of the border and makes it increasingly difficult to build cars in North America,” the Canadian union said. “We need to resolve this, together.”The-CNN-Wire™ & © 2026 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.
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