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Unknown illness kills over 50 in Congo with hours between symptoms and death
- redwood 2y agoI read through a bunch of other articles on this and have not been able to find anything that has more details than this specific article. Sounds like it's possible that it's a malaria variant but far too early to tell
- giantg2 2y agoPretty sure malaria won't cause hemorrhagic symptoms.
- ceejayoz 2y agohttps://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9036688/ https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9036688/ > In recent years there have been reports of viral haemorrhagic fever (VHF) epidemics in sub-Saharan Africa where malaria is endemic. VHF and malaria have overlapping clinical presentations making differential diagnosis a challenge.
- giantg2 2y agoThat's for initial presentation, not disease progression. You might want to read and understand the article before you post it. "Most VHFs and malaria initially present with similar non-specific symptoms and signs of fever, headache, joint pains and weaknesses, posing challenges in differential diagnosis"
- ceejayoz 2y agoThe news article we're discussing states only "hemorrhagic fever symptoms". Which could be "blood from the eyes", or it could be "fever, headache". Is there another source for specific symtoms in this outbreak you're working off? Someone else in the discussion linked https://flutrackers.com/forum/forum/africa/emerging-diseases-other-health-threats-ah/1006020-drc-equateur-two-clusters-of-an-unknown-disease-in-bolomba-and-bansakusu-health-zones-tested-negative-for-ebola-and-marburg#post1008426 https://flutrackers.com/forum/forum/africa/emerging-diseases..., which states: > The disease affects all ages but with a majority of cases from 5 to 45 years old presenting symptoms such as fever, chills, headaches, myalgia, aches, neck pain, polyarthralgia etc. The first cases were reported on February 9. And a WHO statement in there: > Differential diagnosis under investigation include malaria, viral haemorrhagic fever, food or water poisoning, typhoid fever, and meningitis.
- giantg2 2y agoWould it be true to say that last month I had hemorrhagic fever symptoms when I had the flu? No. So it seems the article is just fear mongering with incorrect information if they're are not actual hemorrhagic symptoms and only generic, non-differential symptoms. I can only go off the information I'm given. I can't help if the article is incorrect.
- ceejayoz 2y ago> Would it be true to say that last month I had hemorrhagic fever symptoms when I had the flu? Yes, especially if a few dozen others with the same thing die in a short period and you're in an area where hemorrhagic fever is naturally found.
- giantg2 2y agoLol. No, you would say they have an unidentified febrile illness. You could just as easily say they have symptoms of malaria, or an STD. The inclusion of "hemorrhagic" is either an indicator of information that wasn't expressly stated, or it's incorrect and fear mongering.
- ceejayoz 2y ago> You could just as easily say they have symptoms of malaria, or an STD. Neither tend to kill in 48 hours. Given the location, the mortality rate, and the apparent symptoms, including hemorrhagic fever in the diagnosis possibilities is very reasonable.
- gwbas1c 2y agoPathogens evolve: FWIW: Mutations that cause the pathogen to kill the host quickly often "hurt" the pathogen because it doesn't have a chance to spread to other hosts. Hopefully this illness spreads "slowly enough" that this mutation has a poor chance of surviving.
- card_zero 2y agoThis effect is unfortunately balanced out by ways of killing the host that spray body fluids everywhere in large amounts and help transmission. I mean it's still better for the pathogen if it can accomplish that and keep the host alive, but that's real finesse.
- etiam 2y agoI don't "pathogens evolve" and malaria is a viable reasoning here at all. There's a practically endless list of better hypotheses than Plasmodium suddenly completely breaking it's normal patterns. For what it's worth though, vector-borne diseases in general (such as one spread by insects) are also largely exempt from the (erratic) tendency for the pathogen to evolve some moderation, as the host doesn't need to move itself and only needs to be fresh enough to attract attention from the vector species.
- Palomides 2y agoalmost certainly something like marburg, which has been found there before and is carried by bats
- highwaylights 2y agoArticle mentions testing negative for Marburg, but obviously very concerning
- misiti3780 2y ago[flagged]
- ceejayoz 2y agoI mean, American kids are eating chicken during a bird flu outbreak.
- misiti3780 2y agoa bit different lol
- ceejayoz 2y agoHow so? Americans eat various mammals, birds, etc., including ones they hunt themselves. We have plenty of opportunities of our own to contract zoonotic diseases. What makes a bat weirder than, say, a duck?
- genewitch 2y agoNovember 2019 - present, I would argue. I understand there's avian flu, too. Also: https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/chinese-researchers-find-bat-virus-enters-human-cells-via-same-pathway-covid-2025-02-21/ https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/... I'm only finding vague statements that ducks are a vector anywhere near as impactful as bats. Ducks are filter feeders as well as scavengers and as such bats eat more "vectors" than ducks, in my estimation.
- ceejayoz 2y agoThe point is not "ducks are a specific risk"; the point is "Americans eat plenty of what we'd call 'bushmeat' in the Congo". There's nothing particularly odd about kids having a meal of grilled bat - it's just the local version of something like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brunswick_stew https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brunswick_stew. Chicken and pig farms are likely the biggest zoonotic threats here.
- delichon 2y agoI read that these super fast killing ebola cousins emerge periodically but seldom spread far exactly because they kill before the infected person can travel far. Fingers and toes crossed that this idea is more than cope.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- Miraltar 2y agoQuestion is, can you spread it before the symptoms appear ? Because if the disease kills in less than 48h, it is indead pretty hard to spread.
- feverzsj 2y agoUnless someone weaponizes it.
- ceejayoz 2y agoEbola's been around for ~50 years with no apparent weaponization. Not every pathogen is conducive to being weaponized, nor is the "brilliant but willing to contract Ebola" list likely to be super long.
- cameldrv 2y agoThe Soviets did with Marburg though which is closely related. Allegedly the head of the program Nikolai Ustinov was killed when he was infected in an accident.
- ceejayoz 2y agoThe Soviets tried, just like we tried having people do astral projection. Losing top researchers to the effort is indicative of one of the big reasons it's tough to weaponize - you're quite likely to kill yourself and your own people in trying.
- perching_aix 2y agoIs eating bats a part of the cuisine in Congo, or where did those children get the idea from? Edit: oh, there's a hunger crisis going on there apparently, nevermind. Of its approx. 106M strong population, ~26M are experiencing acute food insecurity. [0] They're also in active conflict with Rwanda? [1] Edit #2: apparently it is part of the cuisine also, see replies below and elsewhere in the thread. [2] [0] https://www.wfp.org/emergencies/drc-emergency https://www.wfp.org/emergencies/drc-emergency [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021–2024_Democratic_Republic_of_the_Congo_attacks https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021–2024_Democratic_Republic_... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bushmeat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bushmeat
- cjcenizal 2y agoThe article notes there are regions where "wild animals are popularly eaten."
- ssfrr 2y agoI saw that phrase and thought it was pretty weird. Hunting wild animals for food is not some fringe thing that happens in "other places" I've eaten tons of fish, duck, deer, elk, etc. that were all "wild animals".
- kamaal 2y agoI think people think of Carnivorous animals, when then they think of wild animals. Simply put, you catch fewer(near 0) infections eating plants. Even more so for animals in the wild.
- dist-epoch 2y ago[flagged]
- michpoch 2y agoIs eating bats in Congo a cultural thing? Or this is just some random idea of these kids?
- ceejayoz 2y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bushmeat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bushmeat
- Cornbilly 2y agoMany African cultures have a tradition of eating “bushmeat” (ie. meat from wild animals). It’s not dissimilar to the tradition of hunting deer/rabbit/etc in the west (which has its own concerns about a disease jumping species like chronic wasting disease aka Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease in humans). However, the diversity of Africa’s “bushmeat” and the economic conditions in some areas seem to increase the chances of a zoonotic disease spreading to humans.
- croisillon 2y agoDo they mean Bolobo? Can't find a Boloko Congo on Google Maps, only Boloko Nigeria.
- ceejayoz 2y agohttps://maps.app.goo.gl/mvSx9GijV19H9YVz9 https://maps.app.goo.gl/mvSx9GijV19H9YVz9
- croisillon 2y agoha! thank you
- raphman 2y agoContinuously updated Flutrackers.com thread: https://flutrackers.com/forum/forum/africa/emerging-diseases-other-health-threats-ah/1006020-drc-equateur-two-clusters-of-an-unknown-disease-in-bolomba-and-bansakusu-health-zones-tested-negative-for-ebola-and-marburg?p=1008426#post1008426 https://flutrackers.com/forum/forum/africa/emerging-diseases...
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- soygem 2y ago[flagged]
- Vox_Leone 2y agoI praise apnews for using "Unknown Illness" instead of the dark pattern-ish "Mysterious Disease", so to the taste of the likes of CNN. Small steps towards reason.
- jackcosgrove 2y agoWhy are bats so often a vector? Is it because they are airborne mammals? Meaning they can cover a lot of ground and come in contact with a lot of other vectors, and also have biology more similar to humans than, say, birds? I am aware that birds are also a common vector, but bats seem to be the greater risk.
- ceejayoz 2y agohttps://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9168486/ https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9168486/ > In vitro work has suggested that molecular adaptations that support the physiology of flight, a trait unique to bats among mammals, may allow bats to tolerate rapidly replicating viruses that express heightened virulence upon emergence in less tolerant hosts such as humans — thus offering a possible explanation for bat virus virulence. Bats and birds share a suite of convergent flight adaptations—both taxa are remarkably long-lived for their body size and appear to circumvent metabolic constraints on longevity through cellular pathways evolved to mitigate oxidative stress induced by flight.
- DamnInteresting 2y agoA colleague of mine wrote about the bat-eating problem in 2006: https://www.damninteresting.com/the-hazards-of-eating-bats/ https://www.damninteresting.com/the-hazards-of-eating-bats/ (Technically this is a self-link, but it wasn't written by me, and there are no ads or the like)
- rich_sasha 2y agoAlso often live in large colonies, so there's lots of transmission. Solitary animals give themselves less chances to incubate something really nasty. I recommend the book "Spillover" about animal-borne diseases which looks at it in detail.
- BrandoElFollito 2y agoWhat is sad is that until the disease spreads out of Africa there won't be much done. I remember as a kid in the 80s that Ebola was a disease in Africa and that people were doing fast after catching it. It is only a few years ago that it started to spread to the US and Europe and suddenly there was a vaccine (or medication, I do not remember) which was researched and produced quickly. The place you are born in probably drives 99% of your future.
- Uw5ssYPc 2y agoAnother fake pandemic brewing to scare the population? Sorry I am not joining the cult.