Mozambique: Cholera kills 131 since September; 19,934 hospitalised – official

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Mozambique: Cholera kills 131 since September; 19,934 hospitalised – official

8:48 CAT | 04 May 2023

Screen grab: TVM

In Mozambique, at least 131 people have died from cholera since September and a further 19,934 have been treated in hospital, according to the latest daily bulletin from the country’s Ministry of Health (MISAU).

There are currently 141 patients with cholera in the country’s hospitals, and 90 new cases have been registered in the last 24 hours, states the update from the National Directorate of Public Health, a branch of the ministry.

Mozambique has a cumulative 29,370 cases of cholera, with a lethality rate of 0.4%.

“This is the biggest epidemic of this disease in the last twenty years,” said the minister of health, Armindo Tiago, at the opening of a meeting on the subject in Maputo.

But, he said, that the number of cases was likely to fall, at the same time as vaccination was progressing.

According to the minister, of a total of 40 affected districts, at least 18 had by Monday declared the end of the epidemic.

Cholera is a disease that causes severe diarrhoea, which is treatable, but can cause death by dehydration if not promptly combated – and is caused largely by ingesting food and water contaminated by lack of sanitation networks.

Mozambique, considered one of the countries most severely affected by climate change in the world, has only a few days left the rainy and cyclonic season, which occurs annually between the months of October and April and is conducive to the spread of cholera.