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Auxilia Katongomara & Thandeka Moyo, Chronicle Reporters
THE cholera outbreak has so far claimed 49 lives with its youngest casualty being an eight month old baby, the Minister of Health and Child Care, Dr Obadiah Moyo, said yesterday.

Of the total number of deaths, 21 percent of those who succumbed to the outbreak are children under the age of five.

Presenting a Ministerial statement in Parliament yesterday, Dr Moyo said due to an increase in cases in Harare and beyond, there were plans for cholera and typhoid vaccines soon.

“As of the 26th of September, over 10 000 persons had been presented to screening and treatment centres and more than 6 645 suspected cases reported of which 96 of them tested positive for vibrio cholera, and 49 have died to date.

“I must also make special mention of the fact that 21 percent of the cases and a similar proportion of the deaths recorded to date are children below the age of five, the youngest patient being eight months old,” he said.

Dr Moyo said there were more deaths due to resistance to the readily available antibiotics since the outbreak of the disease.

“We have realised that the outbreak is unique and that there has been high levels of resistance to the commonly available antibiotics, high fatalities, despite the outbreak being predominantly urban and that it is happening in the same areas that are heavily affected by typhoid and that raises the possibility of dual infection,” he said.

Dr Moyo said due to the high resistance, plans for vaccination for both cholera and typhoid were at an advanced stage with the cholera vaccine expected in the country as of yesterday.

The Health Minister said since the outbreak of the disease, surveillance had been intensified in Harare and nationwide to pick cases early for effective treatment.

“All provinces and city health departments are on high alert; they have activated their rapid response teams and have therefore been reporting the cases,” he said.

“I must hasten to say that immediately on realising that we had an outbreak we activated the fast, prompt emergency plan with the determinants of the outbreak being addressed in the affected suburbs and throughout Harare”.

Dr Moyo said one of the determinants is the availability of water to the affected suburbs and especially targeting schools for safe drinking water through restoring municipal supplies, support installation of water tanks, fixing of sewers, burst pipes and mobile toilets in the key hot spots.

Dr Moyo referred to what he termed as an unprecedented cholera outbreak that began in mid August 2008 to July 2009 which saw 98 592 and 4 288 deaths being recorded.

“Multiple factors interacted to make the outbreak widespread and devastating and many still are depressed in 2018,” he said.

This year’s cholera outbreak was first reported in Glen View and Budiriro and Dr Moyo said the majority of the cases and fatalities were from the two suburbs.

Meanwhile, another cholera case was confirmed at Beitbridge after a woman who had travelled to Harare came back feeling weak and presenting cholera like symptoms.

She was then rushed to Chapfuche Clinic in the border town before she was taken to Beitbridge Hospital when her situation deteriorated.
Matabeleland South Provincial Medical Director Dr Rudo Chikodzore said the woman was in Harare prior to the illness.

“The patient came in from Chapfuche and was in Harare from August 27 to September 3. She is very stable and admitted to hospital,” she said.

Dr Chikodzore said the first patient who was diagnosed with cholera in Beitbridge had already been discharged.

“We are currently holding health education sessions and we are distributing materials in the community. The public is advised to practice good hygiene and wash hands with soap and water after using the toilet, wash hands before handling food including when preparing, use clean safe water, water from open sources should be boiled first or should be treated with Aquatabs or Jik,” she said. —@AuxiliaK /@thamamoe