NAIROBI (Reuters) - The United Nations said on Friday at least 22 people died in an outbreak of yellow fever in south Sudan and not Ebola as originally feared.
The illness, whose symptoms were fever, diarrhoea and vomiting blood, was said to have killed at least 11 people by mid-May and affected 178 people. It was diagnosed as yellow fever at the Kenya Medical Research Institute in Nairobi, said a spokesman for the U.N. humanitarian coordinator for Sudan.
"The World Health Organisation (WHO) has confirmed after testing that the disease is yellow fever. The tests were conducted after the WHO led a team to the area and collected blood samples which were tested in Nairobi," spokesman Ben Parker said.
Mass vaccination would now be carried out by the WHO, UNICEF and other humanitarian organisations working in south Sudan.
The outbreak was first reported earlier this month, and local officials feared it was Ebola, a deadly illness which starts with a high fever and headache and can lead to massive internal bleeding. It is passed on by infected body fluids and kills between 50 and 90 percent of victims.