The Marburg virus that has killed more than 100 people in
Angola is a severe and highly contagious form of hemorrhagic fever. Marburg is
in the same family as the infamous Ebola virus.
The Marburg virus was first discovered in 1967, during
simultaneous outbreaks at laboratories in the former Yugoslavia and Frankfurt
and Marburg, Germany.
More than 30 people fell ill and seven died. Health
officials linked the infections to contact with green monkeys imported from
Uganda for research on a polio vaccine.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says
the Marburg virus is rare, and indigenous to Africa. Cases have occurred in
Uganda, Kenya, Zimbabwe and Angola. The largest recorded outbreak was in the
Democratic Republic of Congo between 1998 and 2000, where at least 120 people
died.
A Marburg specialist at the CDC, Dr. Michael Bell, says
Marburg is less deadly than Ebola, but spread in the same way, through bodily
fluids.
"There's an incubation period that comes first, so for
five or 10 days you probably won't have any symptoms at all,” said Mr. Bell.
“Thereafter, there's the sudden onset of a flu-like illness with fever, chills,
headache, muscle aches things like that. And many patients are nauseated, have
some vomiting. People who get very ill can be jaundiced; they have very severe
abdominal pain. And in a very small number of cases, there is substantial
bleeding."
Dr. Bell says about 25 percent of those infected with
Marburg die, usually from shock or liver failure.
He explains that because there is no known cure, adequate
health care is essential to saving a patient's life.
"The care that we recommend is supportive care,” he
added. “In other words, making sure that there is proper nursing and attention
to things like hydration and fluid status of the patient while they are trying
to recover."
Dr. Bell stresses that caring for Marburg patients
requires appropriate protection for health care workers, like gloves and masks,
items he says that are often in short supply in the areas where outbreaks
occur."
