Hamburg train station platforms closed over suspected Marburg cases

Passengers were evacuated from a train after a man with a recent travel history to Rwanda developed flu-like symptoms

Parts of Hamburg’s main train station were cordoned off on Wednesday afternoon over two train passengers suspected of carrying the highly lethal Marburg virus.

Emergency crews wearing full protective gear boarded a train that had come from Frankfurt, after a man, said to be a 26-year-old medical student, and his girlfriend reported flu-like symptoms.

The man had reportedly travelled to Germany from Rwanda on Wednesday morning and had direct contact with a patient infected with the hemorrhagic fever, which comes from the same family as Ebola and has a fatality rate of nearly 90 per cent.