BURUNDI: Health officials fight cholera outbreak

Photo: microbiologybytes

Cholera is spread by contaminated water. Authorities are battling an outbreak in Bujumbura (file photo)

BUJUMBURA, 30 July 2009 (IRIN) - Health officials in Bujumbura have admitted all suspected cholera patients to hospital and provided clean water to residents lacking facilities in a bid to control an outbreak reported in almost all the capital’s suburbs.

"All the patients coming in with diarrhoea are admitted and put under surveillance," Jerome Ndaruhutse, national programme officer for disease prevention and control at the World Health Organization (WHO) office in Bujumbura, told IRIN.

"Those found with cholera are forwarded to the treatment centre. Those who are still able to drink for rehydration are put in one group while those with acute cholera are put under perfusion."

One death and 62 cases have been recorded since the outbreak two weeks ago.

Ndaruhutse said the cholera epidemic had been "confirmed in laboratories and 13 patients were still in hospital”.

Jean Bosco Nduwayo, deputy director at Prince Regent Charles Hospital, where all the cholera patients have been admitted, said the epidemic started in Bujumbura's northern suburbs but spread to almost all the city's neighbourhoods, including the well-to-do residential area of Rohero, which registered two cases.

The most affected are Kinama and Gihosha suburbs, where 13 and 12 cases, respectively, have been reported. However, Ndaruhutse said there had been no new cases from Kinama in the past week.

Nduwayo said patients were still being admitted to hospital daily.

"Even if the influx is not alarming, two or three patients are still admitted per day,” he said.

Spreading out

The outbreak has since spread out of the city, with the commune of Mutimbuzi, in the nearby Bujumbura Rural Province, reporting nine cases.

WHO, in its capacity as technical adviser to the Ministry of Public Health, has undertaken field missions to assess the situation and held meetings with different partners to step up control measures.

These include the preparation, by the Belgian charity Médecins sans Frontières (MSF), of isolation wards at the Prince Regent Charles Hospital. MSF has since set up tents to cater for cholera patients at the hospital.

Heath officials have also made water available for people with limited access to supplies. With the aid of the NGO Solidarités, a 10,000-litre water tank has been provided for residents of Buterere and Gihosha suburb to the north of the city.

Transport challenge

Ndaruhutse said the transportation of patients to hospital remained a serious challenge to efforts to contain the disease.

"A cholera patient has to look for his own means of transport to reach the hospital; if he admits he has cholera, no one will offer to transport him but if he hides his state, he puts the lives of others at risk since he can contaminate others along the way," Ndaruhutse said.

He said an ambulance should be put at patients' disposal as well as a free telephone line to report new cases.

Pascal Ndayongeje, provincial health director for Bujumbura, said he had consulted the Public Health Minister about organising transportation for patients to avoid spreading the disease.

The northern suburbs of Bujumbura are especially prone to cholera as residents face acute water shortages each year after the national water utility discontinued supplies to the area following the administration's failure to pay bills.

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