First cholera deaths signal start of new Zimbabwe outbreak

Oct 20, 2009, 11:16 GMT

Harare(dpa) - Five people have died in Zimbabwe as a new cholera outbreak that has seen 117 people infected in the last month continues to spread, officials said Tuesday.

Last year, the worst epidemic in Africa in at least the last 15 years killed 4,282 people out of over 100,000 infected, as wrecked health, water and sanitation infrastructure created ideal conditions for the spread of the diarrhoeal pathogen.

The deaths were confirmed by Tstitsi Singizi, spokesperson for the United Nations Children's Fund, which is leading efforts by non- governmental organizations to restore clean water and efficient sanitation to vulnerable areas.

Zimbabwe health ministry permanent secretary Gerald Gwinji said the new cases, the first since the end of the last epidemic in June, occurred across a vast area in the north, east and centre of the country.

He said the five deaths in the remote north were among members of a fundamentalist Christian sect who refuse the use of medicines.

Cholera became endemic for the first time in Zimbabwe's history last year, a situation blamed on years of neglect by President Robert Mugabe's government, the reckless economic policies of which, combined with violent repression, plunged the once-prosperous country into ruin.

The formation early this year of a coalition government between Mugabe and former opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai allowed Western aid agencies to step in and staunch the epidemic.

UNICEF has warned repeatedly that a new outbreak was inevitable with the start of the summer rains.

'The fundamentals of last year's epidemic are still there, in terms of the sporadic availability of water. The situation has been improving, but not to the levels needed,' said Singizi.

UNICEF has been providing households with water purification tablets and other items to reduce the chance of infection. The World Health Organization has also drawn up an elaborate strategy, according to UNICEF, for the treatment of another cholera outbreak.