At least eight people have died in the Lake Zone regions of Tanzania following an outbreak of a strange disease.
Health experts are meanwhile waiting on lab results to confirm the diagnoses, but the patients had typical Marburg symptoms, including headache, high fever, back pain, diarrhea, vomiting with blood, physical weakness, and later on, external hemorrhaging.
The World Health Organization (WHO) however terms the pandemic as Marburg, an Ebola-like malady.
The Ebola-like virus, according to the World Health Organization, was identified in the Biharamulo and Muleba districts, which are in the Kagera region on the shores of Lake Victoria, bordering Rwanda and Uganda.
The agency reports that there were nine suspected cases of Marburg by January 11, 2025.
Among the infected there are several healthcare workers, with a case fatality rate of 89 percent.
The source of the outbreak is not yet known.
“We would expect further cases in coming days as disease surveillance improves,” WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus revealed in a media report.
If it is Marburg then its virus mainly spreads through contact with the bodily fluids of a sick person or surfaces that have been contaminated with those fluids, meaning healthcare workers tend to be at higher risk.
No vaccine or treatment has been authorized for the disease, though several are currently being tested.
Health authorities believe the virus may have spread beyond the Biharamulo and Muleba districts of Kagera.
The risk of infection is currently high in Tanzania and the broader region – including Rwanda, Uganda, Burundi, and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) – but low globally, according to the agency.
“We recommend neighboring countries be on alert and prepared to manage potential cases,” Tedros said.
So far rapid response teams have been dispatched to the area to help investigate and respond to the outbreak.
Local authorities are also said to be tracking down contacts of sick people and setting up treatment camps.
The World Health Organization says the outbreaks of Marburg virus are relatively rare but usually serious with fatality rates ranging from 24 per cent to 88 per cent.
The last known outbreak was in Rwanda, where Marburg killed 15 people and sickened 66 in the course of 2024.
By December 2024 health authorities declared the outbreak over after no new cases were reported for 42 days.
Earlier in 2023, another Marburg outbreak in Tanzania’s Kagera region lasted nearly two months, with nine cases and six deaths.
“Zoonotic reservoirs, such as fruit bats, remain endemic to the area,” the World Health Organization points out.