A man who fell ill on an aircraft from Angola on Tuesday night and was feared to have Marburg fever appears only to have malaria, the Department of Health said on Wednesday.
Departmental spokesperson Solly Mabotha said the man, who originally comes from Eritrea, will be held under observation in an isolation ward at the Johannesburg hospital for ”a while longer”.
”Although we have done a thorough screening of the patient, we want to play it safe and that’s why we’re holding him for a while longer,” he said.
Mabotha said the Johannesburg hospital is one of the facilities that have been chosen to keep suspected Marburg victims in isolation.
The man became ill on a flight from Luanda on Tuesday night shortly before it was due to land, South African Airways spokesperson Onkgopotse JJ Tabane said.
He was handed over to the airport health authorities because it was feared he might be infected with the deadly, Ebola-like Marburg virus. As a precautionary measure the aircraft was placed under quarantine.
”The plane has been disinfected and we will not be using it until we get the go-ahead,” Tabane said.
The Marburg virus had already claimed 235 lives in northern Angola and the number of deaths and cases continued to climb, the World Health Organisation reported on Monday.
The deadly haemorrhagic fever has hit the war-ravaged province of Uige, in the north of Angola, the hardest. – Sapa