Ghana declares first-ever outbreak of Marburg virus disease

Ghana has announced the country’s first outbreak of Marburg virus disease. The Institute Pasteur in Dakar, Senegal, received samples from two patients from the southern Ashanti region of Ghana – both deceased and unrelated – who showed symptoms including diarrhea, fever, nausea, and vomiting. The laboratory confirmed 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. The New England Journal of Medicine published in June 2022 the detection of Marburg Virus Disease (MVD) in a 46-year-old man in Guinea in August 2021. The man died with bleeding from several orifices and the initial diagnosis of MVD was confirmed in...