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Dr Portia Manangazira

Patrick Chitumba Senior Reporter
EIGHT cases of a mild type of measles – rubella – have been detected in the country over the past two weeks with the Ministry of Health and Child Care on alert to curb an outbreak.Head of epidemiology and disease control directorate Dr Portia Manangazira said out of 162 patients who visited the country’s health centres recently, eight were confirmed to have been attacked by the new measles strain.

“There have been cases of rubella that have been confirmed in the country and as a result we have raised an alert so that medical practitioners are on high alert,” she told Chronicle yesterday.

Dr Manangazira said fears were that the existence of rubella could signal the return of measles.

“So far the confirmed cases are that of rubella which is on the mild side,” she said adding that parents with children aged nine months and above should take them for vaccination.

“We’re working with our partners on strategies which we can take to fight this.”

Dr Manangazira said Zimbabwe managed to contain measles in the 1990s and that the disease only resurfaced in 2009-2010.

“We then did a vaccination campaign vaccinating all children below 15 years and we made sure that children who are nine months old get vaccination,” she said.

Rubella, commonly known as German measles, is an infection that primarily affects the skin and lymph nodes.

It is caused by the rubella virus which is usually transmitted by direct contact with an infected person.

The rubella rash can look like other viral rashes but appears as either pink or light red spots which may merge to form evenly coloured patches.

The rash is itchy and a victim can develop a headache, loss of appetite, mild conjunctivitis (inflammation of the lining of the eyelids and eyeballs), a stuffy or running nose, swollen lymph nodes and swelling of joints.

Medical experts say rubella is highly infectious and can also be passed from a pregnant woman to the foetus through the bloodstream.
Infection of the mother by rubella virus during pregnancy can be serious because when the mother is infected within the first 20 weeks of pregnancy, the child may be born with congenital rubella syndrome (CRS), which entails a range of serious incurable illnesses.

Miscarriage occurs in up to 20 percent of cases.

The country’s immunisation rate for child killer diseases stands at 69 percent.

The child killer diseases in the country are measles, polio, diphtheria, tuberculosis, whooping cough, pneumonia and typhoid.