By Sama Jonathan
Updates from by the Ministry of Public, (MINSANTE), indicate that within the last six months, over 2,000 new cases of cholera epidemic have been recorded in the country.
The disturbing statistics, is contained in a recent tweet from the Minister of Public Health, Dr Manaouda Malachie.
It indicates that the South West region tops the Cholera infection chart followed by the Littoral region.
Dr Manaouda in his tweet indicated that 116 new cases of cholera were recorded between March 11 and 17, 2022. The Public Health boss detailed that 76 cases were registered in the South West region, 38 in the Littoral and two in the Centre within the said period bringing the cumulative number of cases to since the fresh outbreak of the epidemic was declared in the country in October 2021 to 2,097 and 62 deaths.
Cholera wrecking havoc in the SW Region
The South West region as per the statistics is topping the infection chart with some 1,387 cases recorded.
Medics from the Buea Health District raised an alarm on the worsening situation of the epidemic, while urging the population to scrupulously respect preventive measures in order to stay safe.
The District Medical Officer for Buea, Dr. Ngund Matthias, in an outing on the state broadcaster, the Cameroon Radio Television, (CRTV), said 16 new Cholera cases were detected with three deaths recorded within 24 hours in Buea.
“Yesterday in the new cluster in Mile 16, we received 16 new patients coming from the community. Unfortunately, we had three deaths in 24 hours. The main clusters are identified in Bomaka and Mile 16 neighbourhoods in Buea,” Dr Ngund revealed.
The medic stated that the start of the rainy season is also a factor that can easily spread the disease from one quarter to another coupled with water scarcity within Buea.
Ngund proposed a multi-sectoral fight to be able to combat the epidemic as well as the putting in place of long term strategies including constant sensitisation and respect of preventive measures.
“I think that the health sector may succeed to contain it for a certain time but we need long term measures,” he said.Cholera infections hits five regions.
As recently reported by CRTV, citing weekly reports from the Public Health Ministry, 55 deaths were recorded in 24 health districts with case fatality of 2.96%.
The statistics indicated that 65 cases have been recorded in the Centre, 255 in the Littoral, three in the North, 1,387 in the South West, 179 South, eight in the Far North regions. It also indicated that 21% of the cases are severe.
The report added that two cases, and one death have been reported in Yaoundé in the Centre Region, with 6 cases in the Nkoldongo and Soa Health District in Yaoundé. Over 842, 100 vaccines will be administered in the Littoral Region, South West, South and Littoral Regions.
In the recent updates however, Dr Manaouda Malachie said apart from the three regions cited earlier, no other region reported new cases “thanks to reactivated vaccination campaign”.
Vaccination underway
Earlier, the Public Health Minister had in a tweet announced that vaccination was underway to contain the spread of the epidemic.
In the South West region for instance, the minister revealed that a vaccination campaign is currently underway with 187,831 persons already vaccinated.
The number, he added, represents 84.3% of the target population.
Before Buea, it is worth noting that Cholera also hit several localities in Ndian Division.
Officials of medical charity, Doctors Without Borders, had through their interventions in Ndian underscored the need for urgent vaccination in order to curb the rising number of infected cases as well as reduce death rates.
