H5N1

Cholera in DRC: Epidemic reported in Maniema, 40 cases tested positive

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Via Actualite.cd: Cholera in DRC: epidemic reported in Maniema, 40 cases tested positive. The Google translation:

The governor of Maniema province, Auguy Musafiri, said Saturday the cholera outbreak in his jurisdiction after forty cases were tested positive in the county seat Kindu.

"In view of these results we declare the cholera epidemic in the province of Maniema, and to do so, we seek the support of the Central Government, humanitarian partners and others, to help us in the proper care Governor Musafiri said.  

He called on the population to give priority to hygiene measures. 

Acute intestinal infection due to ingestion of water, food or food contaminated with the bacillus Vibrio cholera, Cholera is transmitted through droppings, dirty hands or contaminated equipment, is endemic in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Congo.    

It has made more than 900 deaths in 2018.The previous year (2017), cholera had killed 1190 people in the DRC for 55,000 cases.

With thousands of cases registered each year in many provinces, cholera is a major public health problem in the DRC, according to the UN. 

The worst cholera epidemic known to the DRC dates back to 1994. It declared itself in the wake of a massive influx of Rwandan refugees in the eastern city of Goma (Goma) bordering Rwanda. More than 58,000 people died, according to the authorities. 

South Kivu: 130 cases of cholera recorded within a week (provincial division of health)

Via Actu30.info: South Kivu: 130 cases of cholera recorded within a week (provincial division of health). The Google translation:

130 cases of cholera were recorded over a period of one week in the province of South Kivu, announces the provincial division of health on a local media.  

According to Claude Bahizire, communication officer of the DPS, the most affected territories are those of Kabare, Uvira and Fizi with respectively 22 cases, 52 cases and 28 cases.  

The health zone Katana-Idjwi recorded 12 cases, he added.  

The city of Bukavu is also affected by the epidemic with 7 cases recorded in Bagira commune, 5 cases in Kadutu commune and 4 cases in Ibanda commune.  

While urging residents of South Kivu province to observe the hygiene measures established to deal with this epidemic, Claude Bahizire announces the imminent launch of awareness campaigns to stop the spread of the epidemic.

Critical WHO supplies arrive in Sudan to manage cholera outbreak

WHO EMRO has published Critical WHO supplies arrive in Sudan to manage cholera outbreak.

25 September, 2019 – A shipment of 36 tons of cholera treatment medicines and supplies have arrived in Khartoum and are being prepared for distribution as part of the World Health Organization’s response activities supporting the Federal Ministry of Health in Sudan to contain and halt a cholera outbreak.  

The shipment includes 5000 rapid diagnostic tests (RDTs) for immediate detection and screening of cholera patients at health facilities and high-risk areas. RDTs are an essential part of early detection and response activities as their use ensures timely management and reporting of cholera cases.  

The shipment also contains medicines that can treat 2500 severely dehydrated patients, and which will be distributed to cholera treatment centres in Blue Nile and Sinnar states, where cases have been confirmed, as well as in the neighbouring at-risk states of White Nile, Kassala, Gedaref and Khartoum.  

“Even with the rapid depletion of our resources, we are accelerating our coordinated response, including delivering more medicines and supplies,” said Dr Naeema Al Gasseer, WHO Representative in Sudan. “We are working around the clock with the Federal Ministry of Health, state authorities and partners to control the outbreak and prevent more deaths.”  

As of 24 September, a total of 184 cholera cases have been reported, including 128 cases from Blue Nile State and 56 cases in Sinnar state. Eight cholera-related deaths have been recorded by the Federal Ministry of Health, including 6 in Blue Nile State and 2 in Sinnar State.  

Open defecation, lack of clean water outside the capital city and a dilapidated health sector are serious threats in a country of about 40 million people. Cholera, a bacterial disease usually contracted from contaminated water supplies, can be fatal if not treated early. 

As part of an overall integrated cholera response plan, WHO is working with the Ministry, state-level health ministries, United Nations agencies and nongovernmental organizations on surveillance of cases to monitor and control spread of the disease; maintain clean water, sanitation and nutrition; and raise awareness among at-risk communities. 

To date, WHO has deployed international experts to support the ongoing response activities and has trained and deployed 9 rapid response teams, each consisting of at least 3 members, for assessment and surveillance of high-risk areas. 18 health volunteers have also been trained and deployed to conduct water quality assessments in the 2 affected States. 

WHO is also actively disseminating awareness messages on health and sanitation through focus group discussions with community leaders, especially women, and training workshops are ongoing for volunteers on conducting house-to-house and community visits to deliver relevant health messages.

South Kivu: Water shortage at Kalehe hospital

Via 7sur7.cd: South Kivu / Water shortage at Kalehe hospital: MPs urge government to find a solution. The Google translation:

Fearing the outbreak of epidemics due to lack of water in Kalehe hospital (South Kivu), the rapporteur of the Provincial Assembly, Jacques Kamanda challenges the government and invites it to find a solution. 

Jacques Kamanda said that the absence of water is increasingly exposing the health of the population and especially the patients interned in health centers and particularly at the Kalehe Reference General Hospital. 

"It's hard to imagine having a hospital without water, it's putting the lives of the patients at risk, and we call on the authorities to implement their campaign promises so that the people of Kalehe will also find themselves in their right of access. water," he said. 

It is worth remembering that this water shortage has hit the Kalehe territory and especially the Kalehe / Ihusi general hospital for more than six months now.

Oicha IDPs at risk of Ebola contamination

This report tells us a lot about how Ebola and endemic violence complicate each other. Via Koma Ebola: Oicha IDPs at risk of Ebola contamination. The Google translation, with my bolding:

In Oicha, the capital of Beni, several hundred people displaced by the insecurity created by armed groups are exposed to the # bola epidemic. These IDPs [internally displaced persons] share classrooms with students. 

One of the main settlements for these IDPs is Mwangaza Primary and Secondary School, visited by Koma Ebola. Arriving in this makeshift camp, we immediately see critical hygiene conditions. Hand washing kits hardly exist. However, the Ebola virus disease that has been raging in the province for more than a year is not ignored despite the difficult living conditions. It worries these displaced people.  

"We wash our hands with soap or ashes after big needs. We want to return to our respective environments, our children suffer here," said a displaced person encountered on the site. 

"In the fight against Ebola, we try to maintain our latrines, but we do not have appropriate materials. We need support in that direction. (...). We use the same basins to wash the latrines, wash our clothes and wash our bodies, it is serious one is exposed to diseases, "says another displaced.  

Mwangaza School has not been occupied by IDPs for several years. During the school year, as it has been since Monday, students and displaced persons alternate. In the morning, the displaced people take their belongings out to leave the classrooms free for the students. And in the evening, they go back there. 

For the head of this school, protection kits against Ebola are crucial to saving lives. "These IDPs do not take care of sanitation to protect children (...). We have a deficiency of kits like washbasins, gloves and pitchers."  

It must be said, these displaced are forced to live miserably for over 5 years now. They are waiting for the pacification of the Beni area to regain their natural environment and take care of their fields, source of their income. But in the meantime, they face a second enemy, the Ebola virus disease.

A migrant 'humanitarian crisis' in southern Mexico

Thanks to @GeopoliticalJD for alerting me to this situation. Via Diario de Chiapas in San Cristobal de las Casas, in southern Mexico: Declare a humanitarian crisis over the African migrants. The Google translation, edited, and then a comment:

The Jesuit Refugee Service Mexico considers that the situation faced by African migrants stranded outside the 21st Century migratory station should be considered a humanitarian crisis and, therefore, be attended by immigration authorities, regardless of the legal status of those people. 

"Are the immigration authorities waiting for someone to die?" asked the activist Claudia León, whose organization provides legal and psychosocial support to migrants who request shelter or some type of protection.

“The situation we see with the population that comes from Africa, Asia or the Caribbean, such as Cuba or Haiti, is more visible, because of the precarious condition in which it has been since they left their country, added to the fact that the government it has forced them to remain in Tapachula,” she added in an interview.

The situation of the people of Africa “is already of despair, of frustration and anger. They protest the lack of an answer.”

Outside the aforementioned immigration station, dozens of people talk or sleep on makeshift beds made of cardboard while they wait for a safe passage cerificate to travel through the country as, they say, they were granted in other Central American nations.

A man who identifies himself as Diddy, who claims to be originally from Congo and strives to speak Spanish, says that "migration should not leave one alone."

His shirt, shorts and tennis shoes, he says, he was given in the countries where he has been. He has scruffy curly hair and a beard, which is irregularly cut. But that's the least; his biggest concern is to get a piece of bread.

For more than three months "I eat what I can," he says, what they give him, what others leave. After spending the night in the camp, he leaves very early to wander the streets of the city in search of help or something to eat. That same pattern has been repeated the last three months.

In the migrants' place, the temperature exceeds 36 degrees Celsius, for which tarpaulins are placed that protect them from the sun and rain. There are no portable toilets or drinking water to which they have direct access.

Other reports in the Chiapas media say about 150 African migrants are in the fifth day of a protest against being kept away from the government office that could give them transit passes to continue north. Of course they want to reach the US; as bad as their reception would be, it would be better than what they left.

Reports like this have been filtering out of Mexico since the spring, often related to imaginary Ebola scares about Congolese arriving in Texas. The migrants' real health problems stem from the conditions under which they're being kept in Mexico and perhaps on various Central American borders.

I am trying to find out how migrants like these are trafficked out of Africa and into Central America and Mexico. The traffickers are clearly imaginative and enterprising, but they're no better than the Libyan creeps who send migrants out to drown in the Mediterranean.

Beni: ICRC puts Ebola prevention measures in Kangbwayi Central Prison

Via Radio Okapi: Beni: ICRC puts Ebola prevention measures in Kangbwayi Central Prison. The Google translation:

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has facilitated the connection of Kangbwayi Central Prison in Beni (North Kivu) with REGIDESO's water distribution network. In an interview on Thursday 22 August at Radio Okapi, ICRC / Beni's delegate for the protection of the civilian population, Céline Hintermeister, said the measure was being taken to combat Ebola in this prison house.  

"In Beni city we work at Kangbwayi Prison, which we visit very regularly, we attached the prison to the water network so there is a water supply that is good. This also reduces the risk of contamination of diseases and Ebola virus disease in the prison with just hygiene practices," said Céline Hintermeister. 

According to prison sources, Kangbwayi Central Prison in Beni, which has a capacity of 250 people, currently houses 1,100 inmates, including 40 women. 

In an environment where there are many people living together, it is necessary that measures of prevention be put in place to fight against Ebola and other diseases that could prevail, said Céline Hintermeister.  

"There are devices for washing hands, there is temperature measurement, there is even an isolation room in case there is a case. It's really the setting up and the follow-up of these measures that one also makes constantly to ensure that there is no contamination or risk of contamination in the prison," she added. 

Ebola virus disease continues to plague the provinces of North Kivu, South Kivu and Ituri. According to the report of the response team of August 20 and after the last case recorded in Pinga, the total number of health zones affected by the Ebola outbreak has increased to 29, spread over these three provinces.

In Zimbabwe, the water taps run dry and worsen ‘a nightmare’

Via The New York Times: In Zimbabwe, the Water Taps Run Dry and Worsen ‘a Nightmare’. Excerpt:

HARARE, Zimbabwe — It had been five days since water had stopped flowing out of the taps at Eneres Kaitano’s bungalow in southern Harare, Zimbabwe’s modern and tidy capital city. Five days since she had done any laundry. Five days since she had forbidden her children from using the toilet more than once a day.  

On the sixth day, she again rose at 3 a.m. to fetch water from a communal borehole. By the early afternoon, she was still waiting her turn at the tap with her six buckets and cans.  

Much of the city had the same idea. More than half of the 4.5 million residents of Harare’s greater metropolitan area now have running water only once a week, according to the city’s mayor, forcing them to wait in lines at communal wells, streams and boreholes.  

“It is causing us serious problems,” said Ms. Kaitano, a 29-year-old jeans wholesaler who was down to her last clean outfit last week. “We have to stop ourselves from going to the toilet.”

Zimbabwe’s acute water shortage is a result of a particularly bad drought this year, a symptom of climate change. Poor water management has wasted much of the water that remains. Two of Harare’s four reservoirs are empty from lack of rain, but between 45 and 60 percent of the water that’s left is lost through leakage and theft, said Herbert Gomba, the mayor of Harare.

But the water crisis is only a microcosm of Zimbabwe’s malaise. Years of mismanagement under Robert Mugabe, who governed Zimbabwe for 37 years until he was finally ousted in 2017, have left the economy in tatters. Residents are battling daily blackouts that last between 15 and 18 hours; shortages of medicine, fuel and bank notes; and inflation of more than 175 percent.

Yemen: Over 460,000 cases of cholera registered to date this year

I gave up on covering Yemen's public health disasters sometime last year. It seemed pointless to report yet more cholera cases and deaths when nothing was done about it and the Saudi coalition kept blowing up sanitation infrastructure. 

But OCHA has been on the case: Yemen: Over 460K cases of cholera registered to date this year. The full report, and then a comment:

Recent flash flooding has accelerated the spread of cholera across Yemen, exacerbated by poor maintenance of waste management systems and lack of access to clean water for drinking or irrigation. 

As of today, the cholera outbreak has reached over 460,000 suspected cases this year, including approximately 200,000 children. This exceeds the 380,000 total suspected cases in the whole of 2018. So far this year, 705 deaths have been recorded from suspected cholera – versus 75 deaths in the same period last year or nine times more.  

This year, the UN and partners are running nearly 1,200 cholera treatment facilities around the country. However, funding remains an urgent issue. 

Background  

After four years of continuous conflict, the humanitarian crisis in Yemen is the worst in the world. A higher percentage of people face death, hunger and disease than in any other country.  The degree of suffering is nearly unprecedented.   

Eighty percent of the entire population requires some form of humanitarian assistance and protection, an increase of 84 per cent since the conflict started in 2015. Twenty million Yemenis need help securing food and a staggering 14 million people are in acute humanitarian need.   

The Yemen Humanitarian Response Plan requires $4.2 billion to deliver humanitarian assistance to more than 20 million people this year. As of today, only 32% of those requirements have been met. We urge all donors to promptly pay their pledges – including $2.6 billion in pledges made in Geneva more than four months ago. 

Funding is urgently needed to enable humanitarian partners to repair and decontaminate water and sanitation systems, expand epidemiological surveillance and treat patients as quickly as possible.

As long as Crown Prince Mohamed bin Salman persists in his hobby war, and no one demands that he stop, and "donors" continue to postpone their donations, the misery will continue and still more children will die.

New spike in displacement in Eastern DRC further complicates Ebola response, requires urgent relocation and response

Via ReliefWeb, a report from IOM: New spike in displacement in Eastern DRC further complicates Ebola response, requires urgent relocation and response.

Kinshasa – Renewed violence in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) region that is struggling to contain the ongoing Ebola outbreak, has claimed the lives of at least 160 people and displaced hundreds of thousands of others, further complicating the response to the public health emergency. 

“The people who fled the frontline of the conflict are living in dire conditions,” said Fabien Sambussy, IOM Chief of Mission in DRC. 

“Humanitarian actors urgently need access to provide assistance and prevent further massive displacement. We are increasingly concerned that rising displacement creates fertile ground for the spread of disease – most worryingly Ebola – in Ituri province.” 

According to the President of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Felix Tshisekedi, who visited the area recently, an estimated 400,000 persons are currently displaced throughout Ituri Province. 

Djugu Territory has seen a 135 per cent rise in displacement with 20,000 new internally displaced persons (IDPs) registered last month in 12 displacement sites managed by IOM, which has provided Camp Coordination and Camp Management (CCCM) and shelter services since 2018. Thousands more are sheltering in spontaneous sites. 

“Efforts are ongoing to mobilize the necessary resources to determine the number of people displaced and their whereabouts,” added Sambussy, referring to IOM’s Displacement Tracking Matrix (DTM). “Our humanitarian and government partners can use this data to better target and assist affected populations.”  

Poor hygiene conditions in displacement sites severely increase the risk that Ebola, as well as cholera, measles and acute respiratory diseases, will spread. Many of these people are seeking assistance in Ebola-affected Bunia where the displacement site officially called ‘General Hospital Site’ has received more than 5,000 new IDPs, increasing the site’s population to 10,000 – twice its capacity. The overcrowded site, where hygiene conditions are poor, is close to the town’s hospital and the Ebola Treatment Centre (ETC) where 12 suspected and confirmed cases are being treated.  

A plan to relocate IDPs to a new settlement on land owned by Bunia’s Catholic Diocese is currently underway. The 120,000 square meter plot offers favourable conditions for the safe and dignified relocation of IDPs. IOM is mobilizing the financial resources required to start land development as well as the rapid relocation of IDPs exposed to public health hazards and other protection risks.  

IOM is also reinforcing its Ebola surveillance and disease prevention activities in Ituri by supporting health points of control within the country, and Points of Entry at international borders with risk communication, hand washing/hygiene promotion and surveillance activities including temperature screening and collection of key traveller information and health status. 

IOM also uses information on population mobility in the region to target preparedness measures, including in Uganda, South Sudan and Burundi, with the aim of reducing disease transmission to new areas and across borders. 

This recent resumption of violence follows 16 years of relative peace; intercommunal violence in the same area displaced hundreds of thousands of people between 1997 and 2003. The security situation has now deteriorated in resource-rich Djugu and neighbouring Mahagi territories due to intense fighting between Lendu and Hema groups, and conflict between Armed Forces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (FARDC) and non-state armed actors.  

IOM CCCM operations in DRC are funded by the Governments of Sweden and Canada. Ebola activities are funded by USAID/OFDA and the World Bank.