Preparing for Ebola, but Stopping Lassa Fever

NEW YORK TIMES  by Pam Belluck                           March. 17, 2015

Last fall, with the Ebola epidemic raging, the small nation of Benin, a few countries away from the outbreak zone, experienced a cluster of unexplained deaths.

In mid-October, a 12-day-old baby was taken to a hospital in Tanguiéta, in northwest Benin, and died two days later. By early November, three employees of the hospital, St. Jean de Dieu, were dead too.

Ultimately, 16 people fell ill and nine died, including a prominent pediatrician. Ebola was suspected because of symptoms like vomiting and diarrhea. But in mid-November, lab tests were negative for the virus.

“There was a lot of panic,” Catherine Smallwood, a technical officer with the World Health Organization, said. “They didn’t know what it was.” W.H.O. described the incident recently in a report on its website.

The day the Ebola tests came back negative, Dr. Smallwood and a W.H.O.-led team happened to arrive in Benin, part of an effort to help 14 vulnerable African countries prepare for a possible Ebola outbreak. The team suggested that the samples be tested for Lassa fever, a related virus that had never been seen in Benin.

The Lassa tests were positive.

At that point, Dr. Smallwood said, the W.H.O. team initiated “an Ebola response” — only against a different disease. Lassa, common in parts of West Africa and most likely transmitted through rat feces, can be treated with the drug ribavirin, but steps to keep infection from spreading are similar to those for Ebola.

Read complete story.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/17/health/preparing-for-ebola-but-stopping-a-lassa-fever-outbreak.html?_r=0