Ebola suspicion in Berlin is apparently malaria

Ebola suspicion in Berlin is apparently malaria

03/02/2015

A patient who reported in the Urban Hospital in Berlin on Monday apparently did not get Ebola. Doctors of the Charité assume that the man suffers from malaria. The 40-year-old was previously in Africa and showed nonspecific Ebola symptoms.

Patient suffers from malaria
After the delivery of a patient with Ebola suspicion, the Berlin has now given a provisional all-clear. According to a news agency AFP, the clinic said on Monday evening that the Charité experts did not assume that the patient was an Ebola suspected case, „but rather that the affected person is suffering from malaria“. „This supports a positive malaria rapid test.“ It was also reported that an additional blood test for the formal exclusion of Ebola disease would be performed.

Returned from Africa
The man, who had returned from Africa, had previously been transferred to the special isolation ward of the Charité Clinic. „Due to the fact that this man was in Africa and shows flu-like symptoms, an Ebola disease can not be ruled out“, a spokeswoman for the Senate Department for Health and Social Affairs said the decision of the medical officer. At noon, the 40-year-old had first reported in Kreuzberg Urban Hospital, where the doctors on suspicion of Ebola alarmed the medical officer. In addition, the doctors immediately isolated the man according to a hospital spokeswoman and locked several rooms in the clinic.

Examined on isolation ward by specialists
The public doctor, who was called to the Urban Hospital, reportedly ordered the patient to be transferred to the Charité isolation ward in a special ambulance to be examined by specialists. The Department of the Virchow Hospital of the Charité, which can only be reached via air and decontamination locks, specializes in infectious diseases. Basically, the diagnosis of Ebola in the early stages of a disease is difficult. The symptoms are very nonspecific and are similar to many other diseases. Infections cause fever, headache, diarrhea, nausea and vomiting as well as internal and external bleeding.

End of the epidemic in sight?
In recent months there had been several Ebola suspected cases in Berlin. Two weeks ago, a South Korean helper was released from the Charité after an Ebola suspicion proved unfounded. He had no symptoms within the incubation period of 21 days. The patient belonged to a team from South Korea, which had looked after Ebola patients in Sierra Leone. According to the United Nations, nearly 9,000 people have died since the outbreak of the deadly plague. Almost all fatalities occurred in the three West African countries Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone. The Ebola Commissioner of the Federal Government, Walter Lindner, told the news agency a few days ago „KNA“, that the Ebola epidemic could be over by the summer. Accordingly, the significantly reduced number of new infections in the main affected nations hope for an early end to the epidemic. (Ad)