Cholera cases now at 1 540
Latest cumulative figures indicate registered cases of cholera have now risen to 1 540 since December 19 last year, when an outbreak occurred in the country. Machinga District remains the most affected.
With the upsurge in recorded cases, the death toll has also gone up with cumulative deaths registered since December now at 42, according to health authorities.
Ministry of Health (MoH) spokesperson Adrian Chikumbe confirmed the increased figures yesterday but said the ministry is still on high alert, monitoring the response on the ground with its partners.
He said as of Monday, new registered cholera cases were 16 and the breakdown is as follows: Machinga (9), Karonga (2), Salima (1), Rumphi (2) and Zomba (2).
He also said only 20 patients were still in treatment camps which were set up to assist affected people as of Monday.
Cumulatively, Chikumbe said, Machinga has recorded 737 cases followed by Zomba which has recorded 262 and Karonga has recorded 216. The other districts have recorded 50 cases or less.
“Those three districts are the hardest hit. So far from 19th December last year when we started recording cholera cases in the country, we have had 1 540 cases but this is cumulative in all the districts that we have had cholera.
“It is not like all these 1 540 are in the treatment camps now because with cholera you do not stay long in the camps. It is either you get discharged after a day or two or you die. We do not expect patients to stay for a week, unless they have other complications,” said Chikumbe.
He added that there are a number of interventions MoH is taking to contain the outbreak and at district level, it has sustained task force teams which are providing chlorine and other necessary supplies in the cholera situation.
“We are also treating cases of cholera in all camps. When we hear of a case in the villages, we normally rush to take that person to the treatment camp before other people get infected because cholera is very infectious. We have also provided oral cholera vaccine to the hardest hit districts of Machinga, Zomba and Phalombe. That is apart from the continued promotion of hygiene and sanitation messages,” he said.
Machinga is a cholera prone district and started seeing suspected cases in July 2015 which were only confirmed on December 19 2015 after four cases were reported at Nayuchi and Namanja health centres, both involving fishermen from Lake Chilwa.
In January this year, MoH director of preventive health services in the ministry Storn Kabuluzi said zimbowera(temporary shelters constructed on the waters), which people at the Lake Chilwa area reside in, are one of the reasons Machinga has registered the highest number of cholera cases as people use the lake, which is a source of their drinking water, as a latrine.
He said considering those issues, the ministry was talking to the people to look for solutions to the problem and one possibility was asking people to move away from the water to live on dry land where they can probably dig pit latrines and get potable water.
Malawi registered the highest cholera cases in 2008/2009 where 3 250 cases and 82 deaths were recorded. Since then the trend has been declining
