ProMED: Rift Valley fever outbreak reported in Central African Republic for the first time

Epidemics can occur anywhere, at any time.

We publish regular updates, produced by Program for Monitoring Emerging Diseases (ProMED), on outbreaks of emerging infectious diseases to keep you informed on the frequency and impact of our priority diseases.

ProMED is the largest publicly-available system conducting global reporting of infectious diseases outbreaks, with ProMED staff, moderators and team members scanning for, reviewing and posting information relating to global health security from official health reports and media articles.

The below post contains information from health reports, news articles, and academic papers relating to our priority diseases, compiled together by ProMED. Content below may be edited from original ProMED posts for style and length.

These posts provide an overview of disease outbreak activity over the past several weeks. For the latest information relating to outbreaks of infectious diseases, please visit the ProMED website.

Rift Valley fever

Location

Central Africa Republic
 

Outbreak Update

WHO Weekly Bulletin on Outbreak and Other Emergencies, Week 35, 1 September 2019

On 19 Aug 2019, the Institut Pasteur of Bangui in Central Africa Republic, reported a confirmed case of Rift Valley fever in Bossembele health district.

The case-patient is a 45-year-old male farmer from Bogoin village who initially fell ill on 5 Aug 2019 and presented, on 8 Aug 2019, to the local health facility with fever, chills, headache, nausea, asthenia, myalgia, arthralgia and retro-ocular pain. Later test results released confirmed Rift Valley fever infection. As of 24 Aug 2019, the case-patient remained in admission in good clinical condition.

Animal health investigations carried out in the affected community reportedly identified sick domestic animals (mainly cows and sheep), manifesting symptoms such as runny nose, cough and diarrhea. A total of 21 blood specimens were collected from the sick animals (cows and small ruminants) and taken for laboratory analysis and the test results are pending.

Further epidemiological and entomological investigations are ongoing.
 

Outbreak response

The Ministry of Health is coordinating the response to the RVF outbreak through the emergency operations centre, with support from the health partners.

A multisectoral national rapid response team, comprising of both public and animal health specialists, and entomologists was deployed from 21-24 Aug 2019 to conduct in-depth outbreak investigation.

The epidemiological and laboratory surveillance have been enhanced, and healthcare workers have been oriented on the standard case definition for RVF to facilitate early case detection. Data collection and reporting tools have been distributed to the health facilities.

Case management is ongoing in the affected health district, with some suspected cases being managed as outpatients.

Risk communication activities using various channels are ongoing in the affected communities, however this needs to be enhanced.

See the full ProMED post

 

Lassa fever

Location

Liberia
 

Outbreak Update

On Monday 2 September, the Liberian Observer reported that 5 years after containing the deadly Ebola virus disease (EVD), authorities at the Ministry of Health (MoH) have confirmed an outbreak of Lassa fever across the country.

According to MoH data, a total of 92 suspected cases between 1 Jan-25 Aug 2019, including 21 deaths, have been reported. Of these, 25 cases have been confirmed by RT-PCR (Nimba-9, Bong-10, Grand Bassa-5, and Grand Kru -1), while 9 remain suspected cases. The case fatality rate among confirmed cases is 36% (9 deaths out of 25 confirmed cases).
 

Outbreak response

Health authorities are advising people to "Keep your environment clean; cover your dishes to prevent rats excreting or urinating on them; cover food in tightly-closed containers to prevent rats from playing in food or drinking water; do not eat rats, because you can get the sickness by coming in contact with their blood, [urine, or feces] do not dry food in open places where rats can reach; avoid body contact with infected persons and endemic zone; and visit a health facility immediately when you feel sick."

Meanwhile, NPHIL, MoH, and partners have appealed to the general public to take necessary preventive measures, and kindly report cases of fever (any kind) to the nearest health facility.

Confirmation of the outbreak in Liberia has also been reported in Front Page Africa

See the full ProMED post

 

Ebola

Location

North Kivu, South Kivu and Ituri provinces, DRC and Uganda
 

Outbreak Update

DRC Ebola: CMRE update, 30 Aug 2019

DRC:

Epidemiological situation in the provinces of North Kivu and Ituri as of 29 Aug 2019:

Since the beginning of the epidemic, the cumulative number of cases is 3017, of which 2912 are confirmed and 105 are probable. In total, there were 2015 deaths (1910 confirmed and 105 probable) and 902 people healed.
- 399 suspected cases under investigation;
- 13 new confirmed cases, including: 9 in North Kivu, including 3 in Mutwanga, 2 in Kalunguta, 1 in Beni, 1 in Butembo, 1 in Katwa and 1 in Musienene; 4 in Ituri, including 3 in Mambasa and 1 in Mandima.
- 9 new confirmed deaths, including 3 in North Kivu and 1 in Ituri: 5 community deaths, including 2 in North Kivu, including 1 in Katwa and 1 in Beni, and 3 in Ituri, including 2 in Mambasa and 1 in Mandima; 4 deaths in the CTE in North Kivu, including 3 in Butembo and 1 in Beni;
- No healed person left the ETC;
- No health workers are among the newly confirmed cases. The cumulative number of confirmed/probable cases among health workers is 156 (5% of all confirmed/probable cases), including 41 deaths.

Since the Ebola epidemic struck in the northeast of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) 1 year ago, almost 600 of around 850 children who have caught the virus have now died, the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) reported on Fri 30 Aug 2019.

Uganda: 

Congolese case confirmed with the EVD registered in Uganda deceased this Fri 30 Aug 2019. See Voice Of America News
 

Outbreak Response

Since the beginning of vaccination on 8 Aug 2018, 208 321 people have been vaccinated.

Since the beginning of the epidemic, the cumulative number of travelers checked (temperature rise) at sanitary control points is 89 958 698.

See the full ProMED post