Kenya reports polio case
2006-10-17 08:27
Nairobi - Kenya reported its first case of polio in more than two decades on Tuesday in a young Somali child at a refugee camp near its northeast border with Somalia, amid concerns that it may be indigenous.
The health ministry and the World Health Organisation (WHO) had confirmed wild polio in the three-and-a-half-year-old girl, who developed sudden paralysis of her legs last month.
The ministry said: "Investigations have confirmed this to be a case of poliomyelitis", adding that it was the first case reported in Kenya since 1984 and that a probe was underway to determine whether it was contracted in the country or imported.
The ministry emphasised that the girl had been isolated and that "the situation is under control".
A separate statement sent to a global medical clearinghouse, said that the child's mother had told health officials that her daughter had been born at one of the three camps that made up the sprawling Dadaab refugee complex.
Girl 'infected with polio'
The ministry also said that the mother claimed her daughter had been vaccinated for polio at the camp as part of a routine vaccination drive and had never visited Somalia.
It said: "The ministry is trying to confirm whether this is an imported case of polio or was acquired in Kenya. If it was acquired in Kenya, it would be the first reported indigenous case in Kenya since 1984."
The alarming discovery came as thousands of Somalis continued to surge across the border into Kenya fearing unrest as tensions had risen between the country's powerful Islamist movement and weak government.
The ministry said tests by labs in Kenya and South Africa found the girl to be infected with a polio strain matched to one isolated to Somalia's Lower Juba region, the capital of which, Kismayo, was seized by the Islamists last month.
According to the United Nations refugee agency, since Kismayo was taken from a local militia allied to the government, the number of Somalis crossing into Kenya had soared from an estimated 300 to 400 per day to close to 1 000.
More than 30 000 Somalis had fled their home country since the beginning of the year, severely straining resources at Dadaab, about 470km northeast of Nairobi, now home to more than 157 000 refugees.