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HARARE (AFP) – Zimbabwe has launched an oral vaccination campaign aimed at stopping the cholera outbreak that claimed the lives of at least 49 people this month, an official from the organization said Friday. World Health Organization (WHO).
The cholera outbreak, which was first detected in Harare on September 5, prompted the country's health ministry to declare the emergency in the capital.
With 9,000 suspected cases to date, the disease has spread to other cities and rural areas of the country.
Authorities banned public gatherings in Harare while Ministry of Health staff supervised the burial of the victims.
"Oral vaccination against cholera targets a dose with 1.4 million people in densely populated areas as early as one year old," AFP quoted Marc Poncin as saying. expert in WHO immunization in Harare.
"A second dose will be provided within six months to provide protection for at least three years," he said, adding that the protection was temporary and the best way to prevent cholera remained "the improvement of water, sanitation and hygiene".
Residents visited the capital's health centers on Friday for their first dose.
"I came here to get vaccinated. Too many people died of the disease. It's scary, "said Noreen Mahiya, 20.
Cholera epidemics occur regularly in Zimbabwean cities where drinking water supply and sanitation facilities are erratic and infrastructure has collapsed as a result of years negligence.
Zimbabwe, which was run by Robert Mugabe from independence in 1980 until his ouster last year, experienced its worst cholera outbreak in 2008.
About 4,000 people died and at least 100,000 became ill.
Zimbabwean President Emmerson Mnangagwa, who succeeded Mugabe, is committed to fighting the current epidemic that he described as "this medieval disease".
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