Largest outbreak of poor person’s disease in 2020

“How many are aware that we had the largest reported outbreak of Leptospirosis in Sri Lanka last year (2020), according to Epidemiology Unit data,” asks Prof. Suneth Agampodi.

With the pandemic taking a high toll, both in the form of disease and death, other diseases tend to be put on the backburner. But these diseases may have a higher case fatality rate, he laments, focusing on Leptospirosis.

The data are disturbing: Leptospirosis is estimated to affect 52 per 100,000 persons with 730 deaths annually.

First documented in the country in 1953, in more recent times 7,423 cases were reported in 2008 by the Epidemiology Unit.

However, Prof. Agampodi is a firm believer that the true numbers affected by Leptospirosis may not be reflected in national data due to under-reporting in public, private and traditional health sectors; lack of early diagnosis; and being misdiagnosed as many other diseases mimic it.

In 2020, Leptospirosis cases notified to the Epidemiology Unit were 8,579, the highest annual number up to then. Prof. Agampodi argues that based on previous calculations on disease under-estimation, this number may have exceeded 12,066 in 2020, with around 845 deaths.

He points out that one reason could be that with Colombo and Gampaha being high-risk areas for COVID-19, these districts which have usually reported high numbers of Leptospirosis cases in the past 10-15 years, may not be showing true data.

Prof. Agampodi would certainly know what he is talking about because he has been peering at this bacteria and disease through frozen samples in 2003 in Kandy, the major outbreak of 2008, the cases which followed the flood in Anuradhapura in 2011, those who caught the bug after whitewater-rafting at Kitulgala in 2012 and more.