Via Next.com: The threat of cholera in Lagos. Excerpt:
As the rainy season approaches, experts in Lagos have expressed concern about a possible reoccurrence of cholera and the effects it could have in areas of high population density like Lagos. Cholera is a highly contagious disease that causes diarrhoea, severe dehydration and possibly death.
Health experts recall that the disease ravaged many states in Nigeria in 2010. Some of the experts say the federal government has only struggled to contain the epidemic, which killed over 800 Nigerians between March and December, 2010.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) in its report, described the epidemic as the worst in Nigeria in nearly two decades. Henry Akpan, the Chief Epidemiologist in the Federal Ministry of Health, conceded that the cholera epidemic in 2010 was indeed very severe.
"We are still having cholera cases but the cases have been contained and we now have a lot of centres where people receive treatment," he said.
WHO described the 2010 cholera outbreak as the worst in Nigeria since 1991 when 7,654 people died from cholera infections. The Minister of Health, Onyebuchi Chukwu, told a news conference last year that some 13,000 people were affected by the cholera contagion.
However, the United Nations said in October last year that about 40,000 cholera cases were recorded in Nigeria in 2010, while 1,555 deaths were recorded - a sharp contrast with the figures released by the federal government in August.
This year, at least 20 persons died of cholera, while 149 cases had been recorded since the beginning of this year, the Ministry of Health has said. The ministry also noted that although some states recorded cholera outbreaks early this year, the fatality rates had been curtailed through prompt interventions.
