The Gauteng Department of Health confirmed a third case of cholera last week, the first cases being two sisters who had travelled to a funeral in Malawi and returned to the province via bus. The husband of one of the first two confirmed patients has now tested positive.
He displayed symptoms on Saturday and was admitted to the hospital, where his condition is stable
Health-e News reports the Health Department as saying the risk of an outbreak is low, but it has advised people to visit their nearest health facilities if they have mild to severe and watery diarrhoea, and dehydration symptoms.
The department’s outbreak response teams visited the homes of the two identified cases and those of the 18 contacts, and will monitor the contacts for five days as part of the standard protocol.
Meanwhile, alarm is growing as South Africa’s neighbours experience a surge in cases. Since the beginning of this year, Africa has recorded more than 30% of the total number of cholera cases the continent experienced the whole of last year – all from just 10 countries, but mainly from Malawi, which is having its worst outbreak in two decades.
In 2022, reports News24, a record 80 000 cases and 1 863 fatalities, from 15 nations, were reported, yet between 1-29 January this year, an alarming 26 000 cases and 660 deaths were reported in African countries, representing, already, 30% of last year's caseload.
The World Health Organisation fears that if the trend continues, it could surpass the number of cases recorded in 2021, the worst year for cholera in Africa in nearly a decade, it said in a statement.
Most of the newly reported cases and fatalities are from Malawi, and the country’s President, Lazarus Chakwera, attributed this primarily to climate change-induced floods.
Last week, Charles Mwasambo, secretary of health, said all 29 districts in the country had been affected, and by 8 February, there had been 40 284 cases and 1 316 deaths.
“On average, daily, we record more than 500 cases,” he said, with most of the fatalities being people over 50.
The biggest challenge in the fight against cholera was “access to clean water”, especially in “challenging settings, like internally displaced people camps”.
Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Zambia, three of Malawi’s regional neighbours, all recently recorded cases.
In East Africa, Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia are battling breakouts amid a severe and protracted drought that has left millions of people in desperate need of aid, while Nigeria, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Burundi and Cameroon have all also recorded cases.
To enhance sanitation and supply safe water, the WHO is collaborating with nations to increase disease surveillance, preventative and therapeutic measures, community involvement and cross-sectoral coordination with partners and organisations.
The agency said 65 experts had been sent to five African nations, with 40 to Malawi, and a grant of R105m was made available to fight the outbreaks in Kenya, Malawi and Mozambique.
Through the International Co-ordinating Group on Vaccine Provision, around 3.3m doses of the cholera vaccine had already been distributed to the DRC and Kenya. Mozambique will get its shipment in the coming days.
Health-e News article – Cholera: Third case confirmed in Gauteng (Creative Commons Licence)
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