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The recent Marburg Virus Disease outbreak in Rwanda has been praised as a public health and One Health (OH) success story. In this essay, I question this praise. I point to several knowledge gaps or inconsistencies in the narrative of the origins of the outbreak as reported in the scientific literature. Most importantly, I argue that the occurrence of the outbreak, together with some aspects of the response, raises questions about whether OH ethics were adequately implemented. The main aspects are the health and needs of local populations including miners, the health and needs of animal populations and environmental sustainability versus Rwanda’s reliance on mining for economic development. This essay articulates ‘OH ethics’ based on predominant publications in the bioethics literature. I espouse four guiding principles in assessing the outbreak and the response to it. These principles are: the Principle of Interdisciplinary Collaboration, the Principle of Equivalence, the Principle of Shared Benefits and the Principle of Natural Connection.