Frankfurt health authorities have reported two additional malaria cases in Schwanheim, near Frankfurt Airport, after earlier airport-related infections in the summer. The patients had not travelled to malaria-risk regions and are being treated medically, while officials suspect an imported infected mosquito as the likely source.
The new cases add to concern over so-called airport malaria in the area around one of Europe’s busiest hubs. Health officials have warned doctors and residents to watch for fever, headache and abdominal pain, and have opened a hotline for the public. The office is urging local physicians to consider malaria in symptomatic patients, even when there is no travel history, as investigators continue to trace how the infection entered the district.
Earlier cases linked to the airport involved six employees, two of whom died. The latest patients are not airport workers, underlining the unusual pattern of local transmission around the airport zone and the continuing focus on mosquito control and post-flight surveillance at the site.