CDC will test travelers for deadly eye-bleeding Ebola-like illness as it upgrades threat to ‘level 2’

Some travelers entering the US will be tested for a deadly Ebola-like disease amid an unprecedented outbreak in east Africa.

Starting next week, the CDC will screen people who have been in Rwanda in the past 21 days for Marburg virus, a lethal infection that kills nearly nine in 10 sufferers.

Passengers coming from the disease-stricken country will have their travel to the US rerouted to Chicago O’Hare, JFK in New York or Washington Dulles in Virginia, where they will be tested for the virus.

The CDC has deployed three scientists to investigate the outbreak in Rwanda that has so far led to a dozen deaths and 46 infections.

The US has also shipped hundreds of experimental vaccines and therapeutics to assist with the crisis. 

Americans are being urged not to travel to Rwanda unless it is essential, with a ‘level 2’ travel warning now in place to the east African country.

Both Marburg and Ebola cause viral hemorrhagic fevers — conditions that can cause internal bleeding and damage multiple organ systems.

Symptoms appear abruptly, including severe headaches, fever, diarrhea, stomach pain, and vomiting. They become increasingly severe.

In the early stages of MVD — the disease Marburg causes — it is very difficult to distinguish from other tropical illnesses, such as Ebola, and malaria.

Infected patients become ‘ghost-like’, often developing deep-set eyes and expressionless faces.

But in later stages bleeding from multiple orifices — including the nose, gums, eyes and vagina — can occur. 

Like Ebola, even dead bodies can spread the virus to people exposed to its fluids.

The disease is spread between people via contact with bodily fluids, such as saliva, blood, semen, sweat or feces.

People can also catch it by touching towels or surfaces that also can into contact with an infected person.

There are no approved vaccines or treatments for the disease, which is currently treated using supportive care such as rest, hydration and oxygen.

Marburg virus (MVD) is initially transmitted to people from fruit bats and spreads among humans through direct contact with the bodily fluids of infected people, surfaces and materials.

Four vaccine candidates have been evaluated for potential use in trials by WHO, but only one, made by the Sabin Vaccine Institute non-profit, has data from early-stage human trials showing it is safe and led to an immune response. 

Further testing of the vaccines outside of outbreak settings is not possible because of the risks involved.

The Sabin Vaccine Institute said on Saturday it had delivered around 700 doses of its vaccine to Rwanda, to be used in a trial targeting frontline workers, including healthcare professionals.

Marburg virus as only been spotted once in the US when a 44-year-old woman from Colorado who had just returned from a two-week safari in Uganda was diagnosed with the disease in 2008.

The woman had visited a fruit bat cave, with the bats known to harbor the disease. She was hospitalized but made a full recovery.