The Marburg virus, which kills up to 9 in 10 people it infects through horrific bleeding from the orifices, could soon reach Britain, infectious disease experts have warned.
The risk lies in the “silent” incubation period that can last up to a month, meaning patients can be infected but not know it and transmit it to others without knowing it.
Those at this stage of infection could easily board a plane to the UK and become ill after arriving, experts said.
Professor Paul Hunter, a renowned infectious diseases expert at the University of East Anglia, said international travel links meant the Marburg virus could easily be imported into countries such as the UK from Rwanda, the heart of the current outbreak.
Cases of the Marburg virus, which kills up to 9 in 10 people it infects through horrific bleeding from the orifices, could easily reach Britain, infectious disease experts say.
The Marburg virus, a relative of Ebola, causes people to bleed from the orifices and kills up to 9 in 10 of those infected.
“The incubation period is between five and 15 days, which is enough time for someone to get on a plane and fly anywhere in the world,” he said. the sun.
The World Health Organization (WHO) has described the situation in Rwanda as being of “great concern”, adding that there is a high risk of the outbreak spreading to other countries.
However, Professor Hunter said that even if the virus reaches the UK, it is unlikely to spread unchecked due to access to better infection control procedures and highly trained British staff and well-equipped facilities dealing with this. of diseases.
Patients typically experience flu-like symptoms three to ten days after exposure to the virus, although cases of up to four weeks have been reported.
Five to seven days later, patients usually suffer a hemorrhagic fever that causes bleeding from the orifices and has given the Marburg virus its name “eye bleed.”
It is this bleeding, caused by the virus damaging the body’s organs, that makes the pathogen one of the deadliest known to man: 88 percent of patients die in some outbreaks.
Police cordoned off tracks seven and eight for several hours at Hamburg station and travelers were removed from the platforms after emergency services in full protective suits boarded the ICE from Frankfurt over fears that two passengers might have the Marburg virus.
Experts have previously stressed that mortality rates from African outbreaks of the virus are unlikely to be as high in Europe due to better access to healthcare.
But even at the low end of mortality estimates, the virus still kills about half of the people it infects.
By comparison, Covid had killed only about three percent of those infected when it initially burst onto the scene.
In Rwanda, where an outbreak was declared last week, the virus has already infected at least 36 people, killing 11, and more than 400 others are believed to be at risk of exposure.
Most of the deaths are health workers exposed to the sick during the initial stages of the outbreak, Rwandan officials said.
Fears that the virus had already reached Europe emerged yesterday after two passengers on a train at Hamburg station in Germany fell ill with the suspected Marburg virus.
One of the two in question was a doctor. medical student who had just returned from Rwanda.
However, local media reports that the couple tested negative for the virus, although they will continue to be monitored for the next 21 days as a precaution.
It was also reported that another Marburg case had been detected in Belgium.
MVD has a mortality rate of up to 88 percent. There are currently no vaccines or treatments approved to treat the virus.
Authorities have since clarified that one person thought to be at risk was asked to quarantine but has since passed the incubation period without becoming ill.
Marburg virus is initially transmitted from bats, which naturally harbor the virus, to people.
Exposure usually occurs in mines or caves where people work, although the origin of the outbreak in Rwanda has not yet been determined.
From there, initial cases can infect other people with the virus that spreads through contaminated body fluids, including those left on clothing and bedding.
Sexual transmission of the virus can also occur, and research suggests that it can remain viable in semen even up to 7 weeks after the patient recovers.
Even the bodies of the dead can transmit the infection.
UK health bosses are currently required for companies to provide additional monitoring of employees who are visiting or visiting Rwanda.
They have also issued a warning to British travelers traveling to Rwanda, which has direct flights between its capital Kiglai, where the majority of cases have been recorded, and UK airports.
There are currently no vaccines or treatments available for Marburg virus, meaning doctors are focused on helping patients survive the infection.
However, several potential shots are currently being tested, including in the UK.
Rwanda is set to begin using some of these experimental injections and drugs as part of clinical trials during the ongoing outbreak.
A similar policy of using vaccines and drugs under development has been used in previous Ebola outbreaks in an attempt to help save the lives of those directly exposed to known cases.
Rwanda’s Deputy Health Minister Yvan Butera said his country was preparing to distribute these products to its population, but without giving details about what exactly will be tested.
Marburg virus (MVD) is initially transmitted to people by fruit bats and spreads among humans through direct contact with the body fluids of infected people, surfaces, and materials.
‘About to start clinical trials of vaccines and therapeutics to protect high-risk groups,’ he wrote on social networks.
In terms of cases, the Rwanda outbreak is approaching the scale of the 2023 outbreak in Equatorial Guinea and Tanzania, in which 49 people were infected, of whom 41 died, and which was the largest in a decade.
However, it pales in comparison to Angola’s 2004-5 Marburg virus outbreak, the largest on record, with 374 cases recorded, of which 329 were fatal.
The outbreak in Angola was considered to have been exacerbated by civil unrest in the country at the time.
WHO officials have said they are currently advising against any travel and trade restrictions against Rwanda during the current virus outbreak.
Previous outbreaks have seen cases of Marburg virus in places such as the Netherlands and the United States in travelers from the affected countries.
However, there have never been any such cases in the UK, although experts say it is possible.
Most Marburg virus outbreaks disappear after infecting a few people. For this reason, experts say the chances of a pandemic occurring are not high.
Marburg virus was first recognized in 1967, when outbreaks of hemorrhagic fever occurred simultaneously in laboratories in Marburg and Frankfurt, Germany, and in Belgrade, Yugoslavia (now Serbia).
Ultimately, the infections were traced to three laboratories that received a shared shipment of infected African green monkeys for research.
Previous outbreaks have been detected in Equatorial Guinea, Tanzania, Cameroon, Angola, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Kenya, South Africa and Uganda.