Trending 
A third person has died from malaria in Frankfurt in an outbreak linked to the city’s airport, local health officials said on Thursday.
Another person was also infected, bringing the number of malaria cases recorded around Frankfurt since late August to eight, including three deaths. Both latest cases involved residents of the area who live near Frankfurt Airport in the Schwanheim district.
Health authorities said the two people had not travelled to a malaria-endemic area and had no work-related connection to the airport.
According to the Frankfurt health department, they were likely infected by a mosquito that arrived in Frankfurt on board an aircraft. The latest cases follow an outbreak among Frankfurt Airport employees in late August, when six workers contracted malaria, and two died.
Health authorities said no additional cases had been reported to the public health department since the beginning of the week.
“No further cases of malaria have been reported to the public health department since the beginning of the week,” the statement said.
They warned that malaria’s rarity in Germany can delay diagnosis and increase the risk of severe complications.
The health department urged doctors to consider malaria when patients develop unexplained fever, even if they have not travelled to areas where the disease is common. It said doctors should pay particular attention to patients who live near Frankfurt Airport or work there.
Malaria is a parasitic disease transmitted by Anopheles mosquitoes and can cause headaches, nausea, high fever and chills. It causes hundreds of thousands of deaths annually, mainly in sub-Saharan Africa, although treatments are available and patients who receive early care generally recover fully.
The Frankfurt health department said the disease cannot be transmitted directly from one person to another. The Robert Koch Institute, Germany’s public health agency, recorded the country’s last case of airport malaria in 2023.
