The UN’s food agency has issued a desperate plea for cash, warning that hunger is now actively helping Ebola spread in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where cases have officially exceeded 3,200.

“Ebola feeds on delay, fear and hunger,” said Carl Skau, acting Executive Director of the World Food Programme (WFP), in what sounds like a tagline for a horror movie. “Stopping this outbreak requires all hands on deck and communities at the centre.”

The outbreak, declared on 15 May in eastern DRC, is the fastest-growing on record. The culprit is the Bundibugyo virus, a full-blown Ebola strain that causes severe bleeding and kills about 40% of those it infects.

WFP is now emphasizing that food aid isn’t just nice to have - it’s frontline containment. “Food assistance helps families stay home, supports safe isolation, builds trust with communities and keeps health teams moving,” Skau said. “We know what works. What we need now is the speed and resources to scale it before this outbreak outruns the response.”

In other words, hungry people move around more, which is exactly what you don’t want during an Ebola outbreak. Food assistance reduces movement, supports isolation, and lowers the risk of people resorting to desperate measures that might involve, say, eating bushmeat.

The UN is coordinating with WHO and UNICEF to help authorities respond, but the main challenges are speed and resources. Every delay gives Ebola more room to spread, while gaps in logistics, food assistance, and community support weaken containment. Insecurity, access constraints, and community unrest in newly affected areas aren’t helping either.

To keep operations running for the next six months, WFP needs $293.6 million. That covers emergency logistics and food assistance in Ituri and other affected areas. Tune into the daily noon briefing at UN Headquarters, where WFP’s Skau and UN Senior Ebola Coordinator Julien Harneis will field questions via videoconference from Bunia, DRC, presumably while dodging hungry people and virus particles.