Central Darfur: One death from suspected cholera in Nierteti

One person has died at Turr area near Nierteti of ‘acute watery diarrhoea’ suspected to be cholera, however the number of new infections reported is beginning to ease.

On Tuesday, a volunteer reported to Radio Dabanga from Turr that five new cases were transferred from Turr to the isolation centre of Nierteti hospital, while two others were transferred from the northern camp to the isolation centre of the same hospital.

He said that the total number of cases now held at the medical isolation centre of Nierteti has amounted to eight.

Activists in the voluntary work in the areas of west Jebel Marra reported the emergence of five new cases suspected to be cholera that have been transferred to Kuweila and Mara centres in Central Darfur.

An activist in voluntary work told Radio Dabanga that yesterday Kuweila isolation centre recorded two new cases of infection with acute watery diarrhoea, bringing the total cases held in the centre to nine until yesterday.

He added that yesterday Mara isolation centre recorded three new cases, bringing the number of cases there to 11.

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 six more 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.

Follow #CholeraInSudan, #الكوليرا_السودان for ongoing coverage by Radio Dabanga