Haiti cholera outbreak likely to spread

The deadly cholera outbreak in Haiti is likely to get much worse, health experts said as relief supplies were rushed to the quake-stricken country in a struggle to ward off an epidemic.

The UN said 138 people have died, while aid agencies are sending 300,000 doses of antibiotics and 10,000 boxes of water purification tablets to the impoverished Caribbean nation in a bid to prevent more deaths.

The outbreak of cholera, caused by a bacteria that can lead to fatal cases of diarrohea and dehydration, has not been seen in Haiti in over a century, further complicating containment efforts with at least 1,500 people already infected.

“We expect it to get bigger. We have to expect that and react to it,” Jon Andrus, deputy director of the Pan American Health Organisation (PAHO), told reporters in Washington.

The outbreak “is likely to get much larger given our experience with cholera... particularly in a population that has really no protective immunity,” he added.

The cholera outbreak has been reported around the northern Haitian city of Saint Marc, far from the camps hosting hundreds of thousands of people who lost their homes following the January 12 earthquake which killed more than a quarter of a million people.

Health experts have expressed alarm at the speed with which the outbreak has spread, killing its victims, some of whom reported few symptoms, within 24 to 48 hours.

Health Minister Alex Larsen confirmed the strain of cholera seen in camps north of the capital is “the most dangerous type,” and said contaminated river water was seen as the likely source of the bacteria.

Larsen said tests by the WHO confirmed the 01 strain of cholera, which is the most deadly and is responsible for most of the outbreaks around the world.

“We are in a sanitary crisis, this is a new woe for the country which has not seen this disease in the past,” Larsen said after a crisis meeting with President Rene Preval.

The outbreak hit as the country still reels from a devastating earthquake in January that left 1.2 million homeless.

The scope of the outbreak has grown rapidly in the past few days though has not yet reached the major displaced persons camps in and around the capital Port-au-Prince.

But officials fear the illness, which is caused by a bacterial infection in the small intestines, could spread quickly in densely populated tent cities that have poor sanitation and meagre medical facilities, with the potential of unleashing a public health disaster.