Fears of a deadly new viral outbreak have begun to spread after three people died in Argentina this week from a mysterious case of pneumonia.
Six other people have also been infected with “pneumonia of unknown origin,” Argentine health officials reported.
Of the nine people who have been infected, eight were health workers and one was an ICU patient being treated at a private clinic in Tucumán, a small region 800 miles northwest of the capital Buenos Aires.
Health officials expressed growing concern after tests for 30 infections, including COVID, flu and influenza type A and B, came back negative, Tucumán Health Minister Luis Medina Ruiz confirmed to the media on Wednesday. local.
“What these patients have in common is the severe respiratory condition with bilateral pneumonia and involvement in [Z-ray] images very similar to COVID, but that is ruled out,” said Ruiz.
Meanwhile, the European Center for Disease Control’s epidemic intelligence team has been monitoring cases since Tuesday and scientists from the World Health Organization have also started tracking the situation.
“Obviously it’s concerning, but we still need key information about the transmission and hopefully [on the] underlying cause,” Professor Devi Sridhar, chair of global health at the University of Edinburgh and author of “Preventable: How One Pandemic Changed the World and How to Stop the Next One,” saying the Telegraph.
Samples of the unknown virus were reportedly sent for analysis to the Malbran Institute in Buenos Aires and to Argentina’s National Administration of Laboratories and Health Institutes.
Local officials are also testing water and air conditioning units in the area for possible poisoning.
The most recent victim of the virus was a 70-year-old woman who died on Thursday. She had been admitted to the clinic where the infected health professionals worked before a procedure.
It has been suspected that the old woman was “patient zero”, but Ruiz clarified that these facts are still “under evaluation”.
The first patient died on Monday and the second Wednesday after all suffering from “a serious respiratory condition with bilateral pneumonia… very similar to COVID.”
The first six patients began to present symptoms between August 18 and 22. Officials have not said when the three most recently infected people started showing symptoms, but said two are receiving clinical treatment and one is being monitored at home.
This comes almost two and a half years after the The COVID-19 outbreak began to spread across the globe. Since then, several other illnesses have raised fears of another pandemic in the US recently. declaring a state of emergency for monkeypox.
with post wires
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