LAGOS, Oct. 4 (Xinhua) -- At least 11 people have been admitted to hospital in Nigeria's oil-rich Bayelsa following an outbreak of an unknown disease, an official said Wednesday.
State Commissioner for Health Ebitimitula Etebu, who confirmed the development, said the new viral epidemic, suspected to be a "monkey pox," broke out in the state.
He told reporters that a medical doctor and 10 other people who came down with the disease had been quarantined in an isolation center at the Niger Delta University Teaching Hospital (NDUTH) Okolobiri, Yenagoa local government area of the state.
The isolation center was created by the Nigerian Center for Disease Control (NCDC) and the epidemiological team of the state's ministry of health to stop the spread of the disease.
The NCDC and the epidemiological team were tracking 49 other victims, who had contact with the infected people, he added.
The commissioner said samples of the virus had been sent to the World Health Organization (WHO) laboratory in Dakar, Senegal, for confirmation.
He described monkey pox as a viral disease caused by a group of viruses that include chicken pox and small pox, adding that the first case was noticed in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and subsequently had outbreaks in West Africa.
The commissioner said the West African type is milder and has no records of mortality, adding that the virus has the Central African and the West African types.
He said as the name implied, the virus was first seen in monkey, but could also be found in all bush animals such as rats, squirrels and antelopes.
The commissioner listed the symptoms of monkey pox as severe headache, fever and back pain among others, adding that most worrisome of all the signs were rashes bigger than those caused by chicken pox. Enditem
