Nigeria has recorded 42 deaths in the latest outbreak of Lassa fever, the Nigeria Center for Disease Control said late Friday.

The center had on Jan. 21 declared an outbreak of the disease, which kills hundreds in Nigeria every year.

“Since the onset of the 2019 outbreak, there have been 42 deaths in confirmed cases. The case fatality rate in confirmed cases is 19.7 percent,” it said.

A total of 538 suspected cases were reported from 16 of the country’s 36 states, 213 of which were confirmed positive, 325 negative and two probable cases, it said in a situational report.

The World Health Organization (WHO) said Friday it was deploying experts to help curtail the outbreak.

Lassa fever, named after the Nigerian village where it was first discovered, is transmitted from the excreta or urine of Mastomys rats, which are commonly known as “multimammate rats”.

Symptoms of the disease include fever, headache, dizziness, sore throat, malaise, cough, nausea, vomiting, chest pain and hearing loss. (Anadolu)