HOUSTON (AP) – A mariner whose death at sea sparked fears that he’d contracted the West African Lassa virus actually succumbed to malaria, health officials determined.

The victim was identified as Christopher Haley, 36, of Westport, Mass.

The other 19 crew members aboard the ship “Overseas Marilyn” had been voluntarily quarantined in the Gulf of Mexico while the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta conducted tests. The federal agency confirmed on Friday that the Galveston County Medical Examiner’s Office was correct in determining malaria had caused Haley’s Aug. 31 death, Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Stephen Pustilnik said.

No one else in the crew showed signs of malaria, so the ship was allowed to move into the Houston Ship Channel, Pustilnik said.

The ship, which was carrying 24,800 metric tons of phosphate loaded in Morocco, had left Africa on Aug. 13.

Although Lassa fever was a prime suspect in Haley’s death, malaria also was considered because he had recently traveled in mosquito-infested areas of Nigeria, Pustilnik said in Saturday’s edition of the Houston Chronicle.

Lassa fever is spread by rodent droppings and urine or by contact with the bodily fluid of an infected individual. The virus can cause hypertension, shock, fever and death in severe cases, CDC spokesman Llelwyn Grant said.

AP-ES-09-11-04 1412EDT