12 new cases of suspected cholera reach Central Darfur centres

After a few days of showing a downward trend, 12 new cases of ‘acute watery diarrhoea’, suspected to be cholera, have been reported in Central Darfur.

On Wednesday, the state reported 12 new cases in five isolation centres. The new cases came from Kutrum, east of Nierteti, Fogo, southeast of Turr, as well as Kuweila, Kodimara and Korifal west of Jebel Marra.

An activist told Radio Dabanga from Nierteti "The number of the hospitalised cases in the five isolation centres is 33".

He said that a new isolation centre is being opened in Turr to receive the increased cases of infection.

He appealed to the World Health Organisation and humanitarian organisations to support the centres with health aids and help diagnose the disease.

According to cases reported to Radio Dabanga, the death toll in Nierteti this year amounts to at least 24: 18 patients died in February, and seven people in this month so far.

‘Watery diarrhoea’

In spite of numerous independent confirmations (conducted according to World Health Organisation (WHO) standards) that the disease which broke out in Blue Nile State in August 2016 was cholera, the Sudanese authorities and several international organisations still call it ‘acute watery diarrhoea’.

The spread of the infectious disease in Sudan last year turned into epidemic proportions. The WHO and the Sudanese Ministry of Health reported in mid-October that the total number of recorded cases reached more than 35,000 people – including 800 related deaths. Doctors of Sudan’s National Epidemiological Corporation reported in early July however, that nearly 24,000 Sudanese had been infected and 940 cholera patients died.

According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in January, a slight increase in ‘acute watery diarrhoea’ cases was reported in the country during the last week of 2017 and the first week of this year: 46 and 30 new cases respectively were registered.

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