An unidentified disease has killed three people and spread to more than 100 others in the southwest of the Republic of Congo, according to medical sources who suspect swine flu, the A(H1N1) virus.
"Three people have lost their lives since the epidemic broke out" a few days ago, said a local medical source. "A little more than 100 others are being monitored in the hospital" at Londela Kayes, more than 350 kilometres (215 miles) southwest of Brazzaville.
The symptoms are acute diarrhoea, high fever and vomiting.
"We haven't yet received samples that we can analyse to determine the origins of the illness," a doctor at the National Laboratory of Public Health, Jean-Vivien Mombouli, told AFP, adding that swine flu was nevertheless suspected.
"We are at the stage of suspicions. Since H1N1 flu has already affected Brazzaville and Pointe-Noire (home to more than half the population of the country), it's probable that the movements of traders and agents of the state in small places have contaminated people," Dr Mombouli said.
The Congo registered its first cases of the A(H1N1) virus at the end of October in a private school in Brazzaville.
The Congolese authorities state that they have set up an alert system, with the help of the World Health Organisation, making it possible to detect all kinds of flu and to react rapidly.
Share This Article With Planet Earth
