Cholera: Death toll rises to 86, says FG

The Federal Government has said 86 persons out of the 1,623 persons reportedly infected by the cholera outbreak in some parts of the country have died.

The government also directed the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control to immediately coordinate all its response activities and report to the Ministry of Health daily on both the patterns of occurrence.

It said the efforts were to achieve total control of the outbreak.

The cholera  outbreak has affected a number of states including Ogun, Oyo, Plateau, Zamfara, Nasarawa and Lagos.

The Minister of Health, Prof. Onyebuchi Chukwu, in a statement by his Special Assistant (Media and Communication), Mr. Dan Nwomeh, on Monday, also directed all federal  health facilities in the country to provide free services to cholera patients.

Giving a breakdown of the pattern of distribution of the outbreak, Chukwu said, 1,623 cases were reported.

He said, “In Zamfara State, there were 1,110 cases, 51 deaths; Nasarawa State, 105 cases and nine deaths; Lagos State, 134 cases, four deaths; Plateau State, 130 cases, 11 deaths; Oyo State, 29 cases, six deaths; and Ogun State, 115 cases and five deaths, totalling 1,623 cases and 86 deaths.

“These are estimates, because trickles of incidences and mortalities may still be coming. However, in Sokoto and Katsina states, the gastro-enteritis outbreaks have not been proven to be cholera. While further investigations continue, only confirmed cases are included in the current statistics.

“The outbreak in the states mentioned earlier has been confirmed by our laboratories to be caused by vibiro cholerae serotypes 01 and 0139. The affected states are being supported to respond to the outbreak by supplying them with emergency drugs, diagnostic kits and other commodities.”

According to him, the Federal Ministry of Health realises that the affected states will require further assistance adding that efforts are being made to upscale technical and material assistance to those states immediately.

The minister also directed immediate release of adequate quantities of emergency drugs and cholera kits to all the affected states for prompt and adequate treatment of cases and additional deployment of rapid response teams from the ministry to all the affected states to assist in investigating and verifying the cases and tracing of contacts.

PUNCH