DRC:
Typhoid confirmed in western Kasai Province
Source: IRIN
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NAIROBI, 20 September 2007 (IRIN) - Five cases of typhoid fever have been confirmed in
Kampungu, western Kasai Province in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), where investigations for Ebola are ongoing, a UN World Health Organization official said. "We are seeing multiple
causes for the reports of illness and death," Gregory Hartl, WHO communications advisor, said on 20 September. "We are not able to say what proportion is suffering from what disease,"
he added. "The response is complicated because we are dealing with more than one disease." Laboratories have been set up in the province for onsite diagnosis with an isolation ward being
set up in Kampungu. There are plans to set up more wards in Mweka and Luebo areas. "So far, we do not have the full epidemiological picture as to how many cases there really are," he said,
adding that all cases of Ebola were being isolated in order to halt the spread of the disease. According to the WHO, figures released by various sources mention 375 cases and 167 deaths in western
Kasai Province, but the causes cannot be confirmed yet. Only one case of Shigella, and less than 10 of Ebola, have been confirmed. According to Hartl, the risk of Ebola spreading to neighbouring
countries was relatively low. On 19 September, the Tanzanian health authorities sent out a warning of Ebola haemorrhagic fever to people living in regions neighbouring the DRC. "All regional
medical officers have been instructed to keep on alert because people from eastern parts of DRC enter into Tanzania," Wilson Mukama, Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Health and Social
Welfare, said. Approximately 1,850 cases, with over 1,200 deaths, have been documented since the Ebola virus was first identified in the western equatorial province of Sudan, and in a nearby region
of DRC in 1976, after significant epidemics in Yambuku, northern DRC and Nzara in southern Sudan. aw/jm© IRIN. All rights reserved. More humanitarian news and analysis: <a
href="http://www.IRINnews.org">http://www.IRINnews.org</a>
