AMINU ABUBAKAR, Kano | Thursday
THE embattled government of northern Nigeria’s most populous state admitted on Wednesday the scale of a cholera epidemic that has left more than 700 dead and hospitalised thousands.
After weeks of denying the seriousness of the outbreak, which began in October and spread like wildfire through the narrow streets of this ancient city, the Kano State government finally admitted on Wednesday it was facing a “crisis”.
“The epidemic has been worse than we expected,” Kano State Health Commissioner Mansur Kabir said in an interview here, saying it was “a crisis situation”.
At least 600 people had died so far in Kano, he said, a day after officials in neighbouring Jigawa state admitted at least 100 had died there.
Thousands have been hospitalised and more are dying every day, health workers said. “If they are admitting to 600 dead in Kano, the toll could actually be far higher,” one said.
Kabir agreed that the toll in Kano was at least 600 and could be more.
“One wouldn’t be wrong to be say that no fewer than 600 people have lost their lives,” Kabir said. The outbreak was “very serious”, he added.
The declaration of a major cholera outbreak or epidemic is embarrassing for the authorities in mainly-Muslim northern Nigeria, coming as it does just weeks before tens of thousands of Nigerian Muslims are due to take part in the annual hajj, the holy Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca, in Saudi Arabia.
Saudi authorities have the power to ban pilgrims from countries where cholera has been declared, for fear of spreading the disease to the millions attending the pilgrimage, and hence worldwide.
For years, Kano, an ancient trading city of stone and mud-built houses, narrow walkways and back alleys, has suffered a series of epidemics because of its poor sanitation, lack of hygiene education and often polluted drinking water.
Authorities in the state have often been criticised for over their response to the epidemics with little done in terms of health education and shortages of staff and supplies.
The ministry has been reluctant to accept some assistance offered and only this week took supplies from Unicef and the World Health Organisation.
Often called a poor man’s disease, cholera is a debilitating waterborne viral disease characterised by diarrhoea, vomiting, muscle cramps and severe loss of body fluids, which can lead to death.
Kabir said that during his visits to one of the two main hospitals treating cholera suffers, he had himself contracted the disease, but that he had been cured.
“I am always going to the IDH,” he said, referring to Kano’s Infectious Diseases Hospital. “I believe I must have contracted cholera through that process but however I was admitted and am now fine,” he said.
The commissioner also admitted that pollution in the public water system, for which the state government has responsibility, was the probable cause of the outbreak.
The health ministry has previously insisted the source of the outbreak was badly prepared food.
“We don’t rule out the possibility of water being the main cause of the epidemic in the state,” he said. – AFP