"Large" Rift Valley Fever outbreak in South Africa

An outbreak of Rift Valley Fever (RVF), described as "large" by South Africa's National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD), has claimed the lives of two people and poses a significant threat to livelihoods in major farming areas.



"It is difficult to provide a comparison of this outbreak with previous ones, as it is ongoing - at the moment it is a large and significant outbreak," said Prof Lucille Blumberg, deputy director of the NICD. Neighbouring Namibia has reportedly banned live animals and meat products from South Africa.



The livestock industry is the biggest agricultural sector and contributes up to 49 percent of agricultural output. "South Africa generally produces 85 percent of its meat requirements, while the remaining 15 percent is imported from Namibia, Botswana, Swaziland, Australia, New Zealand and Europe," the government's information website said.



RVF is a contagious viral infection transmitted to humans mainly by direct or indirect contact with the blood or organs of infected animals, especially domestic animals such as cattle, sheep, goats and camels. The disease has been confirmed in seven of South Africa's nine provinces, and has infected 60 people.



Among animals the RVF virus is spread primarily by the bite of infected mosquitoes, mainly the Aedes species, which can acquire the virus from feeding on infected animals, according to the World Health Organization.



Heavy summer rain over large parts of South Africa in the past few months has created good conditions for the RVF virus to thrive. "We are hoping for some cold weather," Blumberg said.



"There is no evidence of mosquito-transmitted human infection to date", the NICD said in a communiqué, and most human infections were the result of direct contact with infected animal tissue or fluids.



The last major outbreak of RVF in South Africa - 10,000 to 20,000 human cases - took place between 1974 and 1976 during prolonged heavy rains, according to the NICD. Small sporadic outbreaks have been recorded since then.



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