Marburg virus: What Canadians need to know about the fear spreading in Germany – National

German emergency workers wearing full protective gear shut down two trains at Hamburg Central Station on Wednesday after two passengers were suspected of having the deadly Marburg virus.

A 26-year-old medical student and his girlfriend developed flu-like symptoms while on a train from Frankfurt, according to local reports. The train was evacuated after health authorities suspected it had been infected with the Marburg virus – a rare disease with a fatality rate of up to 88%.

The suspicions arose because the student had just arrived by plane from Rwanda, where he met a patient who was found to be infected with the virus, local media reported. The passengers later found out that they did not have the deadly and contagious virus.

But the immediate response raises the question: what if it was Marburg?

Rwanda is currently dealing with an outbreak of the disease that began on September 27. According to the Ministry of Health, the death toll has risen to 11, as at least 36 cases have been confirmed.

“The Marburg virus is a very serious disease. It is found in Africa and is very similar to the Ebola virus,” explained Dr. Isaac Bogoch, an infectious disease specialist at Toronto’s main hospital.

“We know that there was an outbreak of the Marburg virus a few decades ago. Whenever this breaks out, it is taken very seriously because it can be fatal in a short period of time.”

While the situation in Hamburg was ultimately a false alarm, Bogoch said local and international health agencies remain vigilant as the outbreak in Rwanda continues.

Here’s what you need to know about the virus.

Marburg is a virus from the same family as Ebola.

It is a hemorrhagic fever and has a mortality rate of 50 percent, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), although rates have been as high as 88 percent in previous outbreaks.

Symptoms usually include a sudden high fever and severe headache, as well as vomiting and diarrhea, followed by uncontrollable bleeding.

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Marburg outbreak: 8 dead in Rwanda due to virus, health officials say

Like Ebola, the Marburg virus is believed to have originated in fruit bats and is spread between people through close contact with infected people’s bodily fluids or surfaces, such as needles or dirty sheets.

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The virus was first identified in Marburg, a city in Germany, and Belgrade, Serbia, in 1967, after laboratory work with African green monkeys from Uganda led to human infection, according to the WHO. Since then, there have been outbreaks and outbreaks in Angola, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Kenya, South Africa and Uganda, the WHO said.

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WHO says 4 high-risk contacts identified after Marburg virus case reported in Guinea

The virus spreads to humans from prolonged exposure to mines or caves where fruit bats live, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

It can also spread between people, through direct contact with the body fluids of infected people, or through surfaces or objects contaminated with those fluids, such as blood. It does not travel in the air.

“It is a contagious disease. Therefore, the longer it takes to implement measures to prevent and control the infection, the more people will be exposed to the disease, the more outbreaks of the disease will increase,” said Bogoch.

“And sadly, people (will) come to this disease.“

There are no approved vaccines or treatments for Marburg.

Early care with rehydration and symptomatic treatment improves survival, says the WHO.

Although there is no approved vaccine, on Thursday Rwandan health officials announced that they will begin clinical trials of experimental vaccines and treatments in the coming weeks.

“This is part of our efforts to help people recover quickly by using vaccines and drugs designed to fight this outbreak, which is in the final stages of research,” the country’s health minister, Sabin Nsanzimana, told Reuters.

“We are working with the pharmaceutical companies that developed these, as well as the World Health Organization, to speed up this program through multi-national cooperation.”

The WHO said it is working with governments and holding a meeting of industry, academia and government partners to speed up access to vaccines and treatment doses for testing.

Four vaccines have been tested by the WHO, but only one, developed by the nonprofit Sabin Vaccine Institute, has data from early human trials showing it is safe and elicits an immune response.

Further testing of vaccines outside of outbreak settings is not feasible due to the inherent risks.

Several treatments could be tried, including Gilead Sciences’ remdesivir, an antidote used during the pandemic to treat COVID-19 and developed to treat Ebola, related to Marburg.

“Although there is no specific antiviral drug for Marburg or a licensed vaccine, there are candidate drugs and vaccines that may work,” Bogoch said.

“Sometimes those can be applied to these outbreaks through behavioral research and see if this can help end outbreaks and generate data to support future outbreaks.”

Outbreaks of Marburg virus occur mainly in Africa. There have been no cases in Canada, the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) reported.

As long as precautions are taken, there is little chance of contracting Marburg virus in a country where the disease is endemic, adds PHAC.

This virus has also been a nationally notifiable disease in Canada since 2000. As a nationally notifiable disease, cases of Marburg virus are reported to PHAC through national surveillance programs.

PHAC said it is also working closely with its national and international partners, including the WHO, to track any outbreaks in Marburg.

Although the virus has not spread to Canada or the United States, Bogoch said it is still important to control it as it is a highly contagious disease.

“We know, for example, in the related virus, the Ebola virus, there was a large outbreak in West Africa in 2014 involving many countries. And it’s very difficult to get those under control when the size of the outbreak is so great,” he said.

“One of the biggest concerns is not only the spread to other parts of Rwanda, but also to other borders, especially in areas where contact tracing and isolation from health care may be a challenge.”

He emphasized that the best way is an “all hands on deck” strategy to quickly contain the outbreak and prevent its spread to Rwanda and neighboring countries.

— via files from Global News’ Katherine Ward and Reuters