According to the health ministry, the Marburg virus has claimed the lives of five people in Tanzania's Kagera district in the country's northwest. The dangerous Ebola-like virus frequently causes high fevers, but Tanzania's Health Minister Ummy Mwalimu said the illness had been contained. The Tanzanian government and the World Health Organization (WHO) collaborate to "rapidly scale up control efforts to limit the virus's spread."
No vaccines or antiviral medications have been licensed to treat the virus. It is a severe, sometimes deadly sickness with symptoms such as headache, fever, muscular cramps, vomiting blood, and bleeding. Survival has increased with rehydration using oral or intravenous fluids. Since its discovery in 1967, the Marburg virus, an epidemic in Africa, has been responsible for hundreds of fatalities and infections.
The virus has been found in five countries, and after the infection claimed the lives of five individuals, Kenya and Uganda strengthened border security checks with Tanzania. The virus is carried via fruit bats and body fluids.
Thus the World Health Organization (WHO) has applauded Tanzania's efforts to stop it. There are no vaccinations or medications for this illness; instead, clinicians treat patients' unusual symptoms by giving them water intravenously or orally.
SOURCE: BBC News
