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A new disease could emerge in Africa (Photo: REUTERS / Goran Tomasevic)
This was stated by Jean-Jacques Muembé-Tamphum, African microbiologist, Director General of the National Institute for Biomedical Research, Democratic Republic of the Congo. In 1976, he helped identify the Ebola virus, writes CNN.
He said that in the western city of Ingende, a woman was hospitalized with signs of hemorrhagic fever, but after a few weeks, tests did not show that she had Ebola or any other disease known to medicine.
Muembe-Tamfum believes that a woman can be «Patient “zero” of the new pathogen. Its lethality can be 50 to 90% that of the Ebola virus. About half of the patients die from the disease caused by this virus.
The patient was isolated and did not share personal information about herself to protect the woman from attacks by local residents. Her loved ones can communicate with her only through a transparent plastic window.
The symptoms at that time had already passed, but it is still unknown what the woman was ill with. Doctors fear the disease will return.
Muembe-Tamfum calls a possible new disease Disease X. This is how the World Health Organization classifies a hypothetical outbreak of a previously unknown disease that could lead to a pandemic.
«X “in the title means unpredictability. In 2018, the WHO included Disease X in the global plan to accelerate research and development for health emergencies.
