Cholera outbreaks in southern Somalia have killed 57 people in the past week, health officials said on Tuesday.
The outbreaks have occurred in Mogadishu, the port of Merka and Jowhar, and more than 830 people have been infected with the waterborne disease, said Osman Haji Mohamud Dufle, Health Minister in the weak transitional government.
Doctors from hospitals in the three areas confirmed the deaths.
”The disease is rapidly spreading among the people in rural areas and farmers, as well as those in Mogadishu refugee camps who have no access to proper medical care,” the doctors said in a joint statement.
Cholera, an acute bacterial infection of the small intestine that causes severe diarrhoea and kills by dehydrating the victim, has been endemic in Somalia for the past decade. Outbreaks of the disease often occur in southern Somalia during the two annual dry seasons when water becomes scarce. The first dry season ends this month.
The Horn of Africa nation has not had an effective central government since the 1991 ousting of dictator Mohamed Siad Barre, and much of the country’s infrastructure has been destroyed by a decade of banditry and clan-based fighting.
The country has no state water system and few health facilities.
The transitional government was elected at a peace conference in neighbouring Djibouti in August 2000, but it has little influence outside pockets of Mogadishu.
Dufle said that outbreaks are spreading at an ”alarming” rate because of a lack of medical facilities. — Sapa-AP