Lassa fever death reported in Guinea

Authorities in Guinea have announced the first death from Lassa fever in more than two decades, heightening anxiety about another haemorrhagic fever in the West African country where an Ebola epidemic first emerged.

The Ebola outbreak in late 2013 went on to kill more than 11,000 people, in part because local authorities and the international community were slow to act when cases first popped up in a rural part of the deeply impoverished nation.

In a government statement, health authorities confirmed that at least one person was dead and more than two dozen others had been monitored for possible symptoms. However, critics questioned why the government was only now making the news public when the victim died on 11 January.