Cholera hits Sierra Leone
2004-08-27 21:37
Freetown - Driving rains lashing Sierra Leone are spreading the first cholera outbreak in four years around the war-torn west African state, infecting more than 300 people and leaving some 30 dead since early August, officials said on Friday.
Health Minister Abator Thomas took to the airwaves to encourage residents of the capital Freetown to boil water before drinking it to stop the spread of the bacterial infection.
"Steps are being taken to control the epidemic," said Thomas. "The situation has not reached an alarming point as it has been contained."
The World Health Organization has distributed vaccines and medicines to help Sierra Leone deal with the outbreak, particularly in hard-hit areas such as Rokupa in the eastern part of Freetown.
Cholera, a bacterial infection of the small intenstine, is characterized by extreme dehydration and diarrhea, and thrives in conditions where water sources are compromised through poor sanitation.
Freetown's war-ravaged infrastructure and public utilities, coupled with weeks of rain that has crumbled buildings and clogged gutters with raw sewage and filth, have been a veritable incubator for the disease.
Noah Conteh, director general of medical services for the health ministry in the west African state, said Monday there had been "increasing reports of cases of watery diarrhea in clinics in the capital in recent weeks and laboratory tests conducted on collected specimens have confirmed evidence of cholera".
Health workers at local clinics are bearing the brunt of the patient influx as the capital's main referral center, the Connaught Hospital, is undergoing massive restoration work. The decrepit facility was plundered during Sierra Leone's decade of civil war.
Cholera invaded west Africa in 1970 after more than a century, spreading around the region and becoming endemic across the world's poorest continent, according to the WHO.
It is relatively simple and inexpensive to treat and its spread can be arrested through proper food hygiene and the safeguarding of drinking water.