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Marburg virus toll hits 150
04/04/2005 10:56 - (SA)
Luanda - An outbreak of the deadly Ebola-like Marburg virus has intensified in Angola, claiming more than 20 lives over the past three days and taking the nationwide toll to 150, early on Monday.
"In total we have registered 163 cases among them 150 dead," Angola's vice health minister Jose Van-Dunem told reporters on Sunday.
"A fourth person has died in Luanda, but all of them came from the province of Uige", the epicentre of the outbreak about 300km north of the coastal capital.
The official toll had stood at 130 on Friday.
A combined statement by the World Health Organisation and the Angolan government meanwhile said 80 percent of the cases involved children under 15.
A severe haemorrhagic fever similar to Ebola, the Marburg virus spreads on contact with body fluids such as blood, urine, excrement, vomit and saliva.
The disease was first identified in 1967 in Germany after laboratory workers were infected by monkeys from Uganda.
The Marburg outbreak has claimed a record number of lives in Angola, overtaking an earlier peak in the neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo.
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