A third person has died from malaria after a cluster of cases near Frankfurt Airport, according to Frankfurt’s city administration. The death occurred at a Frankfurt hospital, and the person was one of two recently infected residents of Schwanheim, a district immediately near the airport.
The two neighbourhood cases were reported on Tuesday. City officials said both patients were infected with Plasmodium falciparum, the parasite responsible for malaria tropica, despite having neither travelled to a malaria-endemic region nor worked at the airport. The public health department said the infections may have resulted from bites by a mosquito transported to Germany on an aircraft or in luggage.
Six airport workers contracted malaria tropica in July, authorities said. Two of those workers later died, bringing the reported death toll associated with the cluster to three. German officials have described the outbreak as extremely rare and linked to air traffic.
Malaria is a potentially life-threatening disease transmitted by certain mosquitoes. The source report said it is not spread through direct human-to-human contact and is extremely rare in Germany. Symptoms can include fever, chills, headaches, confusion, seizures and breathing difficulties.
Fraport, the airport operator, said it installed mosquito traps and sent captured insects to a laboratory in Antwerp, Belgium, during July and August. Results were not yet available, according to the report. Health authorities have asked doctors in the area to consider malaria when assessing patients with fever and urged airport workers and residents with possible symptoms to seek medical advice.
An airport spokesperson said local public health authorities had the power in principle to order airlines to disinfect aircraft. The supplied statement did not say whether such an order had been issued.