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Polity
Article by: Sapa Published: 09 Dec 2008
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| Hogan to assess cholera outbreak | |
| Health Minister Barbara Hogan is leading a team visit to Limpopo on Tuesday to assess the cholera outbreak which has left at least eight people dead, and over 600 receiving treatment at the province's towns bordering Zimbabwe. She will visit operations in Musina set up to assist the ill, and will tour the Musina showgrounds where a rehydration treatment station has been set up. Her delegation will include her deputy Molefi Sefularo, World Health Organisation representative in South Africa Stella Anyangwe and Lucille Blumberg of the National Institute for Communicable Diseases. They will also visit Madimbo, about 100 km away and will brief the media after that visit. The treatable illness has been caused by severe water provision problems in Zimbabwe, and, due to strained health facilities there, the ill have crossed the border to South Africa for treatment. Those not responding to rehydration are being admitted to hospital, with 57 people receiving treatment in hospital by Monday afternoon. An added complication has been a flow of untreated sewage from the Limpopo River on the Zimbabwe side of the Beit Bridge border post. Neighbouring Mozambique and Botswana are concerned about the implications of this. However, treated water in Musina was found to be safe, according to drinking water quality regulations manager Leonardo Manus. Zimbabwe government and United Nations figures released last week showed at least 560 deaths and 12,500 cases of cholera had been recorded in Zimbabwe since August. |
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