Posted on 04/10/2005 8:52:43 PM PDT by Mother Abigail
Killer virus red alert as more die April 11, 2005
By Own Correspondents and Sapa-AFP
Pretoria/Uige:
South Africa has begun implementing precautions against the deadly Marburg haemorrhagic fever, which has claimed the lives of 193 of the 218 people infected in Angola in the worst outbreak of the disease yet.
South Africa's precautions follow a World Health Organisation (WHO) warning to countries neighbouring Angola that they should go on the alert.
The WHO said late last night that 360 people were being monitored in Angola, where the disease broke out in October.
A severe haemorrhagic fever akin to Ebola, the Marburg virus is spread through contact with body fluids, such as blood, urine, excrement, vomit and saliva.
It can, however, be contained by taking fairly simple health precautions, experts say.
Detailed life histories are being taken down and vigilance has been increased at all points of entry into South Africa. These measures are South Africa's first line of defence.
"There is concern about an outbreak in South Africa as there is a lot of travel between Angola and South Africa," said Lucille Blumberg, of the National Institute for Communicable Diseases.
Health officials say, however, that it would be too time-consuming and expensive to test everyone entering South Africa for the disease.
"We can't take blood from everyone," said Bonnie Maloba, a doctor.
"What we need to do is exclude people and the best way to do this is to take a detailed history." Top South African pathogen expert Adriano Duse has been asked to join the international team trying to contain and overcome the deadly virus.
Duse, the National Health Laboratory Service's (NHLS) chief specialist, has been contracted by WHO and the Global Alert and Response Network to join the multinational team working in Angola's Uige province - the epicentre of the outbreak.
Through the NHLS, South Africa's expertise has contributed to research and combating infectious diseases, including previous, smaller outbreaks of Marburg fever.
Duse said he had been selected for his expertise in infectious diseases and infection control.
"I will be joining an international team in Luanda and then we are in the hands of the WHO and UN to take us to where we are needed," he said.
The WHO has warned the Congo, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Namibia and Zambia - all bordering Angola - to be on alert for outbreaks of the virus.
Epidemiologists in Uige are working overtime to trace new cases of the virus, which has sparked panic in Angola.
Every morning, teams from the WHO search the town of Uige for new cases.
"We visit our contacts and look for suspected cases," Francois Libama, a WHO epidemiologist, said.
"If we find a suspected case, we call in the special teams to remove the body."
At the WHO's temporary headquarters in the town, a blackboard gives a grim account of the latest death toll.
"Two corpses in Candombe Velho. Two corpses in Candombe-Novo. One alert in the Popular Quarter. One corpse at the cemetery," it reads.
FYI
Thanks Mom...
bttt
> ... Marburg virus is spread through contact with body
> fluids, such as blood, urine, excrement, vomit and saliva.
> It can, however, be contained by taking fairly simple
> health precautions, experts say.
This information may be outdated and fatally incorrect.
As I was pointing out on an earlier thread:
... even as of today, the CDC, at:
http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dvrd/spb/mnpages/dispages/marburg/qa.htm
is still telling people that Marburg:
* has a 5-10 day incubation
* is 23-25% fatal, and
* is not airborne, requiring direct contact with fluids
So they suppose an Ebola-like situation where symptoms
arrive fast, the infection is unlikely to be passed
until symptoms are evident, and moderate precautions
protect care providers.
Instead, we seem to have a 20-day virus, 99% fatal, and
possibly airborne. If so, it has massive pandemic
potential, and the official response to date, world-wide,
is suicidally inadequate.
Plus, we have another report of bodies being abandoned
in place in Angola, which means that animals will now
contract and spread the virus to all susceptible
biological populations.
Sure glad they're right on top of it!
and
We visit our contacts and look for suspected cases," Francois Libama, a WHO epidemiologist, said. "If we find a suspected case, we call in the special teams to remove the body."
me dumb. they look for suspected cases and when they find them, have the bodies removed?
That's quite a diagnostic team!
Ping.
More.
One day at a time.
Yup.
BM and BTTT
Thanks
Can animals carry it too (sorry I'm not up to date on this)?
Given today's near instant global travel one hopes more than SA are thinking about quarantines and/or travel restrictions.
Mother Abigail,
Is this a ping list for the Marburg virus, and if so, may I be on it?
Pretty please?
How did you arrive at airborne?
Hemorrhagic diseases seem to be endemic in Africa; they also seem to affect the less-mobile segments of society; why do you fear the potential for airborne transmission?
More bad news, it can be passed from person to person during incubation. Sweat is also infectious.
If it were easily spread, there would likely be over 18,000 cases in 6 months.
The real problem isn't so much the disease (except for those directly involved.) The problem is the lack of vector identification. Were the vector know, one could give advice about what to avoid.
In the hanta virus outbreak here in northern NM (land of the flea, home of the plague), within a week, the virus was identified, and the main transmission vector (breathing dried mouse urine) was noted. Now people take precautions and there are few cases. (Spraying a woodpile with a weak Chlorox solution isn't a bad idea; neither is washing barn floors, etc. with the same.)
Does anyone have a ping list for these Marburg / Infectious disease threads??
If so, I would love to be included.
Thanks
>> ... we seem to have a 20-day virus, 99% fatal,
>> and possibly airborne.
> How did you arrive at airborne?
I didn't. I saw the question raised in:
Marburg Spread Inside and Outside Angola
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1380939/posts
Indeed.
I read that on previous threads. And, even more bad news, it is possible that this is airborne. Finally, anyone can travel from any land point on the globe to any other land point on the globe (sans the polar regions) in 24 hours.
This situation bears watching closely.
Curiously, I have not seen it on MSM. Thank God for FreeRepublic!!
Aerosol droplet dispersal--sneezes and coughs--are as bad as airborne, imho.
Between this and the avian influenza in Asia........it is hard to keep track.
It is obvious that some people are trying to start paying attention.
That is a major part of the problem for the rest of the world.
Bump
You mean 88% fatal.
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/newssearch.php
Why aren't people giving the exact number when it's provided in the very first sentence of the article? The case fatalitity rate is not at or near 100%; the case fatality rate is 88%.
ping
Even at 88% that is pretty darn near.
Yet the rate of infection remains arithmetic.
I believe the answer is that different people are at different stages of infection. Those at an earlier stage of infection haven't died, yet. Sorry, this seems so morbid.
There have now been reports of Marburg in four areas in Angola, in the Congo, in South Africa, in the capital of Angola (Luanda) which has an international airport, with direct flights to Houston.
There are also nine people in 21 day isolation quarantine in Italy. There is no report anywhere of their status.
Admitted case numbers are 213 with 17 healthcare workers dead. No one knows how many cases there actually are, WHO is speculating that there are twice as many, but I doubt they have any idea.
I just don't like fuzzy math. :)
Unknown.
That may be true, but the case fatality rate at this point is nonetheless 88%.
Until there are any who have recovered from this, we do not actually know the case fatality rate. To put it another way, no one has yet survived.
Why aren't people giving the exact number when it's provided in the very first sentence of the article? The case fatalitity rate is not at or near 100%; the case fatality rate is 88%
The big question is how many have recovered?
That number appears to be zero.
Transport by aircraft is not airborne transmission; it is simply a modern vector for distant contact.
Bats are thought to carry it.
Here's my conjecture, that I've seen elsewhere: Bats eating insects off fruit, leaving the virus in urine. Child picks and eats fruit, becomes infected.
Yes. Monkeys are the Marburg vector.
Well I didn't want to ask a dumb question, but 218 people in 6 months over such a wide area hardly seems like panic proportions. I'm thinking more along the same lines as you are, unless I'm missing something.
That makes as much sense as any theory I've heard.
Oh, yeah. Bats too. Slipped my mind.
I do note the 17 health-care workers who have given their lives. Even as ill-equipped as they are, that has to give us a clue that this one is really, really nasty.
> You mean 88% fatal.
It depends on which report we rely on, but in any event,
it's not the 23-25% the CDC is showing. With the
collapse of case management in Angola, it may be some
time before a reliable figure emerges. And that's part
of the problem there, as the local population is convinced
it's a 100% fatal disease, and is panicking accordingly.
But the disparity between the CDC figures and even the
lowest of the field numbers makes me think that this is
not the Marburg of yore. Perhaps it's a new strain,
although I'm not a subscriber to fringe theories that
it's some wild new avian cross.
I do tend to agree with one observation here, which is
that is this is a strain that's long incubation, 100%
fatal, and airborne transmissible, infection rates would
be expected to be dramatically higher than have been seen
so far. Puzzles abound.
Excellent point. With the WHO teams out of the Uige area for even a day or two there's a lag in the data. Transmission through the administrative pipeline and waits for confirming lab results contribute in part/ I don't think that WHO or CDC or Medecins sans Frontieres were prepared for this rapid spread,nor could they have been based on the history of Marburg. And this strain very definitely is something different.
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