Ebola like Marbug virus kills 9 at Equatorial Guinea,alert issued

Nine people have died in Equatorial Guinea from an "outbreak" of the Marburg virus, which causes a hemorrhagic fever nearly as deadly as Ebola, the health minister said Monday, announcing that a province had been placed in quarantine.

The government had announced last week that it was investigating the cause of suspect cases of hemorrhagic fever in a densely forested eastern region near the borders of Gabon and Cameroon on Africa's central western coast, but said only three people had shown "light symptoms".

Health Minister Mitoha Ondo'o Ayekaba told a press conference that a health alert had been declared in Kie-Ntem province and the neighbouring district of Mongomo, with a "lockdown plan implemented" after consulting with the World Health Organization and United Nations.