NAIROBI, KENYA (AP) — Equatorial Guinea has verified eight new instances of the “highly virulent” Marburg virus, a fatal hemorrhagic disease for which no vaccine or therapy is available.
According to the World Health Organization, this takes the country’s overall number of cases in the outbreak announced in mid-February to nine.
There are currently two Marburg epidemics on the African continent. Tanzania reported eight instances of Marburg this week, with five fatalities. A health professional was among those slain.
“Our pathogen genomics team will sequence samples from both locations… and see if there is a link between the current two outbreaks,” Ahmed Ogwell, interim head of the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told media on Thursday. He stated that the findings would be available within a week.
According to the WHO, the new instances in Equatorial Guinea were discovered in the provinces of Kie Ntem, Litoral, and Centro Sur, all of which border Cameroon and Gabon.
“The areas reporting cases are about 150 kilometres (93 miles) apart, suggesting wider transmission of the virus,” the United Nations agency said.
The Marburg virus, like Ebola, begins in bats and spreads between people through direct touch with sick people’s body secretions or surfaces, such as tainted bed linens. Without therapy, Marburg can kill up to 88% of those who contract the illness.
According to the WHO, Marburg outbreaks and isolated cases have previously been documented in Angola, Congo, Kenya, South Africa, Uganda, and Ghana.
After causing concurrent illness breakouts in labs in Marburg, Germany, and Belgrade, Serbia, the rare virus was first discovered in 1967. When the virus was spread during studies on monkeys, seven humans perished.
