The Marburg Virus Case Study

In August 1967, a mystery virus infected workers from labs in Marburg and Frankfurt, Germany. Four weeks later, workers from a lab in Belgrade, Serbia, appeared to have the same illness. Twenty five lab workers from the three labs became sick. From the original infected, the virus spread to their medical personnel and a family member that were taking care of them. By the end of the outbreak, thirty one people were infected, and seven people died. The virus was identified to be the Marburg virus, named after the town in Germany with the most infected. (CDC 2014). Prior to the identification of the virus in 1967, very little is known about the history of the virus. It is possible that the disease had existed previously, but no information exists about the virus prior to 1967. The virus was identified by virologists in Marburg and Hamburg, Germany, three months after the initial outbreak.

Because of the few differences that the two viruses share, there is no differences in how they are handled by medical personnel. Doctors and nurses that treat or may come into contact with the patient wear protective clothing and follow disinfection procedures which have been found to lower the possibility of infection. Patients with a filovirus are isolated from other patients and the public who may be susceptible to becoming infected. There are currently no vaccines or antiviral treatments for either Ebola or the Marburg virus. Supportive care is required as the patients typically require intravenous fluids or oral rehydration. Depending on the specific outbreak of the virus, the fatality rate may range from twenty five percent to more than eighty percent. The averaged fatality rate of the Marburg virus is eighty two percent, compared to the fifty percent fatality rate of the Ebola virus (that british