Geneva: The deadly Marburg virus has claimed two lives in Ghana's southern Ashanti area. A laboratory in Senegal confirmed the presence of the deadly virus in the deceased individuals after testing their samples.

The patients, who were both from the southern Ashanti region but were unrelated, showed symptoms including diarrhoea, fever, nausea and vomiting.

They were taken to a district hospital in Ashanti region, but later died.

According to doctors, those infected with this virus have various symptoms including fever, vomiting, headache. The virus was earlier detected in Guyana. 

The WHO's data from past outbreaks shows death rate among those infected with the "highly contagious" virus can range from 24 to 88 percent. 

"No new cases have been reported since the two samples were taken two weeks ago," the Ghana Health Service said in a statement.

The service said 34 people who had contact with the cases were in quarantine. 

"The health authorities are on the ground investigating the situation and preparing for a possible outbreak response," the WHO's Ghana representative Francis Kasolo said. 

"We are working closely with the country to ramp up detection, track contacts, be ready to control the spread of the virus."

If the cases are confirmed, this would be only the second outbreak of MVD in West Africa.

A single case was confirmed in Guinea last year.

It's viral haemorrhagic fever in the same family as Ebola.

It's highly infectious and was initially detected in 1967 after outbreaks in Marburg and Frankfurt in Germany and Belgrade in Serbia.

The WHO says those outbreaks were linked to laboratory work using African green monkeys, which had been imported from Uganda.

But a type of fruit bat, Rousettus aegyptiacus, is considered to be the the natural host of the virus. 

"The Marburg virus is transmitted to people from fruit bats and spreads among humans through human-to-human transmission."

Human-to-human transmission occurs though direct contact — via broken skin or mucous membranes — with blood, secretions, or other bodily fluid of people infected with the virus. 

It also spreads via contact with surfaces contaminated with these fluids. 

The WHO says it can spread via contaminated clothing and bedding used by a MVD patient and burial ceremonies that involve direct contact with the body of a deceased patient. 

The WHO says there's "no proven treatment available" for MVD, with no vaccine or approved antiviral treatments.