July 18 (EUROPA PRESS) –
The Ghanaian authorities have identified nearly a hundred contacts after confirming in laboratory tests their first two cases of the Marburg virus, similar to Ebola, as confirmed by the Ghana Health Service.
The director general of the Ghana Health Service, Patrick Kuma-Aboagye, has indicated in a statement that “following reports of the preliminary finding of two cases of Marburg virus in the Ashanti region on July 7, 2022, (… .) it is announced that tests at the Pasteur Institute in Dakar have corroborated the results”.
“The samples were sent to the Pasteur Institute in Dakar with the support of the World Health Organization (WHO) for validation in line with standard practices, marking the first time that Ghana has confirmed Marburg virus,” he said. .
Thus, it has detailed that the two patients – already deceased – presented symptoms consistent with this disease and has added that a total of 98 contacts have been identified and are in quarantine and under supervision, without new cases having been confirmed so far. .
In this regard, he stressed that “it continues its response measures to prevent new cases while working with all relevant agencies to ensure that, if there is a case, it is not overlooked by the health system.”
“Community activities are being strengthened with the participation of volunteers for supervision who act as eyes on the ground for the health system and who will report any unusual developments,” he explained.
The cases detected in Ghana are the first in the country and the second in West Africa, after the one detected last year in Guinea.
Virus symptoms include headache, vomiting blood, and muscle aches. The disease is spread through contact with infected blood or other body fluids and tissues. There are no approved vaccines or antiviral treatments to treat the virus.
In Africa, previous outbreaks and sporadic cases have been reported in Angola, Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Kenya, South Africa, and Uganda, in addition to a case detected in August 2021 in Gueckedou prefecture in southern Guinea.
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