900,000 doses of cholera vaccine for Rohingya

COX’S BAZAR: The World Health Organisation (WHO) yesterday began distributing 900,000 doses of cholera vaccine in camps for Rohingya refugees as authorities rush to prevent a major outbreak of the deadly disease.

More than 10,000 cases of diarrhoea had been reported in the past week alone, WHO said.

Doctors in two clinics said there had been several cases of patients with symptoms of cholera, a virulent diarrhoea that kills within 36 hours if not treated.

Cholera has not been identified in testing of patient samples by the Health Ministry, though clinics said they were waiting for results for samples sent last week.

“There’s a clear risk for cholera,” said Dr N. Paranietharan, a WHO representative in Bangladesh.

“Sporadic cases are inevitable, (but) we are not expecting a major outbreak like Yemen.”

War-torn Yemen is in the grip of a cholera crisis, with more than 750,000 sufferers afflicted by the bacteria, which is spread when contaminated faeces is ingested, usually through the water supply.

The cholera vaccination campaign in Bangladesh, the second largest in history, would be crucial to containing any outbreak, said Paranietharan.

Traumatised and malnourished refugees are crammed into bamboo and canvas huts packed across muddy hillsides.

Faeces lies in lanes that flood in the rain.

More than 3,000 latrines have been installed, but many overflow and sit above pools and creeks where refugees bathe.

Many new wells for drinking water were shallow and had become contaminated by sewage, said Paranietharan. Reuters