29 May,2009 08:50 AM IST | | AP
Scientists have identified a lethal new virus in Africa that causes bleeding like the dreaded Ebola virus. The so-called "Lujo'' virus infected five people in Zambia and South Africa last fall.
Four of them died, but a fifth survived, perhaps helped by a medicine recommended by the scientists.
It's not clear how the first person became infected, but the bug comes from a family of viruses found in rodents, said Dr. Ian Lipkin, a Columbia University epidemiologist involved in the discovery.
"This one is really, really aggressive'' he said of the virus. A paper on the virus by Lipkin and his collaborators was published online yesterday on in PLoS Pathogens.
The outbreak started in September, when a female travel agent who lives on the outskirts of Lusaka, Zambia, became ill with a fever-like illness that quickly grew much worse.
She was airlifted to Johannesburg, South Africa, where she died.
A paramedic in Lusaka who treated her also became sick, was transported to Johannesburg and died. The three others infected were health care workers in Johannesburg.
