Another epidemic? Ghana confirms Marburg virus disease outbreak, two dead

The Ghana Health Service has confirmed the country’s first-ever outbreak of the Marburg virus disease.

The development was announced in a statement issued on Sunday.

According to the statement, two deaths have been recorded, while at least 98 contacts have been traced and quarantined.

According to the World Health Organisation, Marburg virus is one that causes fever as experienced by persons who contract Ebola.

It said, “Marburg is a highly infectious viral haemorrhagic fever in the same family as the more well-known Ebola virus disease.”

In a statement on the development, the WHO added that the two persons confirmed to have died after contracting the Marburg virus, had reported at the same hospital.

“The Institut Pasteur in Dakar, Senegal, received samples from each of the two patients from the southern Ashanti region of Ghana – both deceased and unrelated – who showed symptoms including diarrhoea, fever, nausea and vomiting.

“The laboratory corroborated the results from the Noguchi Memorial Institute for Medical Research, which suggested their illness was due to the Marburg virus.

“One case was a 26-year-old male who checked into a hospital on 26 June 2022 and died on 27 June. The second case was a 51-year-old male who reported to the hospital on 28 June and died on the same day. Both cases sought treatment at the same hospital within days of each other,” the statement reads.

The organisation added that it is working with the Ghana health authorities “by deploying experts, making available personal protective equipment, bolstering disease surveillance, testing, tracing contacts and working with communities to alert and educate them about the risks and dangers of the disease, and to collaborate with the emergency response teams.”