Thirty-four persons under quarantine following contact tracing over two confirmed Marburg virus disease in the Ashanti Region have tested negative says the Ghana Health Service (GHS).
The 34 were tested after coming in contact with the two patients who succumbed to the virus.
Director, Public Health of the Ghana Health Service, Dr. Franklin Asiedu Bekoe told GBC that Noguchi Memorial Institute for Medical Research validated the result after the samples taken.
He mentioned that this is the first-ever of such infections in the country.
The Director-General of the Ghana Health Service, Dr Patrick Kuma-Aboagye, said the two persons were identified at different locations in the Ashanti Region with acute hemorrhaging fever.
“Their blood samples were sent to the Noguchi Memorial Institute for Medical Research. Preliminary results suggest the infection is due to MVD,” he said.
However, he said, the blood samples of the two, who had died, had been sent to a WHO facility, the Institute Pasteur in Dakar, Senegal, for further confirmation.
He said the two patients from the southern Ashanti Region – both deceased and unrelated – showed symptoms including diarrhoea, fever, nausea and vomiting.
Dr Kuma-Aboagye said the country’s surveillance mechanism was already on red alert due to COVID-19 response and was capable of picking other suspected cases for the needed actions.
“In addition, 34 contacts of the two cases have been identified and are under quarantine and being monitored,” he said.
By Vincent Kubi