Lebanon’s Ministry of Health confirmed Friday a total of 18 deaths and 413 people affected by the cholera outbreak that is sweeping the country, according to a new balance sheet in which it identified seven new cases and no additional deaths in the last 24 hours.
Cholera has reappeared in Lebanon for the first time since 1993 following an outbreak in neighboring Syria, which has already recorded more than 20,000 suspected cases and 75 deaths, and at a time when the country and its health care system are already undergoing a severe economic and financial crisis.
«The numbers are on the rise,» the Ministry said in a statement reported by ‘L’Orient le Jour’, «but we believe that we still have a golden opportunity if we act quickly to minimize the epidemic and avoid moving into a phase of high contagions throughout the country.»
The World Health Organization (WHO), for its part, estimates that the number of suspected cases now exceeds 1,400 in an outbreak that is spreading in all regions of the country despite the efforts of the authorities, as feared by its regional director of emergencies, Rick Brennan.
The number of cholera outbreaks has risen sharply worldwide this year, mainly due to increased flooding, drought, conflict, migration and other factors affecting access to clean water, according to WHO.
WHO is supporting Lebanon with medical staff, equipment and laboratory resources, in addition to providing assistance in clinics and hospitals. The organization is also working with the country’s government to obtain 600,000 doses of a vaccine that is in increasingly short supply.
