STAT HEALTH NEWS – A person from Iowa who recently returned to the United States from West Africa has died after contracting Lassa fever, a virus that can cause Ebola-like illness in some patients. State health officials reported the case on Monday.
The unnamed person was described as a middle-aged individual from eastern Iowa. The statement said the person had been cared for at University of Iowa Health Care.
It did not indicate how long he or she had been in care or if the individual had sought care anywhere else before being admitted to the hospital.
That is important because while person-to-person spread of the Lassa virus is rare, transmission can occur in health care settings, especially if health workers don’t realize they are dealing with a patient who has the disease and don’t take adequate precautions.
Testing conducted on Monday by the Nebraska Laboratory Response Network indicated the person had Lassa fever; confirmatory testing will be done by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
No details were released about when the person developed symptoms or even when he or she returned to the United States.
The CDC said in a statement, however, that the individual was not sick while traveling, so “the risk to fellow airline passengers is extremely low.”
Although there have been previous Lassa fever cases imported to the United States, they are not common occurrences.
The statement said there have been eight known imported cases, including the new one, in the past 55 years …
Lassa Fever
WHO – Lassa Fever is an acute viral haemorrhagic illness that is endemic in some countries of West Africa. For example, Benin, Ghana, Guinea, Liberia, Mali, Sierra Leone, and Nigeria.
The number of Lassa virus infections per year in West Africa is estimated at 100,000 to 300,000, with approximately 5,000 deaths. Unfortunately, such estimates are crude, because surveillance for cases of the disease is not uniformly performed.
In some areas of Sierra Leone and Liberia, it is known that 10%-16% of people admitted to hospitals every year have Lassa fever, which indicates the serious impact of the disease on the population of this region.
The incubation period of Lassa fever ranges from 2-21 days. It is transmitted to humans via content with items (food or household) contaminated with infected rodent urine or faeces.
Person-to-person transmission may occur after exposure to virus in the blood, tissue, secretions, or excretions of a Lassa virus-infected individual. In hospital lacking adequate infection control measures, person to person infections is possible. Case fatality rate among hospitalized patients with severe cases of Lassa fever is 15%.
The signs and symptoms of Lassa Fever is usually gradual. It starts with fever general weakness, and malaise. After a few days, headache, sore throat, muscle pain, chest pain, nausea, vomiting, diarrhoea, cough, and abdominal pain may follow. In severe cases facial swelling, fluid in the lung cavity, bleeding from the mouth, nose, vagina or gastrointestinal tract and low blood pressure may develop.
Deafness occurs in 25% of patients who survive the disease. In half of these cases, hearing returns partially after 1-3 months. Death usually occurs within 14 days of onset in fatal cases. About 80% of people who become infected with Lassa virus have no symptoms.
