More on Meningitis
------------------
Are all these countries in the meningitis belt in Africa? Is this the
usual time for this outbreak? I recall that WHO normally plans for
these meningitis outbreaks. Subscribers interested in following this
outbreak can go to the IRIN web site: http://www.reliefweb.int/IRIN
All the best,
Dr. Leela McCullough
Director of Information Services
SATELLIFE
30 California Street, Watertown, MA 02472, USA
Tel: +1-617-926-9400
Fax: +1-617-926-1212
mailto:leela@usa.healthnet.org
http://www.healthnet.org
--
BURKINA FASO: Meningitis death toll still rising
OUAGADOUGOU, 12 April (IRIN) - The meningitis death toll has contin-
ued to rise in Burkina Faso despite assurances last week by health
authorities that the epidemic was regressing. The Health Ministry an-
nounced on Wednesday that deaths had risen to 1,379, out of 9623
cases.
Last week the death toll had passed the 1,000 mark for the first time
this year. "Our main problem is that we do not have enough doses of
vaccines to have everybody vaccinated in the districts at the same
time," the secretary-general of the Health Ministry, Mathias Some,
told IRIN on Wednesday. He said the shortage had persisted even
though one million doses of the meningitis vaccine, provided by the
World Health Organisation, had arrived in Burkina Faso last week.
Burkina Faso's authorities have already issued over 2.5 million
doses, but are now facing bitter criticism from people who think the
government failed to take adequate preventive measures. Twenty-six of
the country's 53 districts are affected by the epidemic, which broke
out in early January. In 1996, a similar outbreak killed over 4,300
people out of the 42,967 who were infected.
Meningitis, an infection of the membranes that protect the brain and
spinal cord, surfaces annually during the dry season in the arid belt
just south of the Sahara - from Senegal in the west to Ethiopia in
the east. Countries that have been hard hit this year include Niger,
Benin, Chad and Ethiopia.
[This item is delivered in the "africa-english" service of the UN's
IRIN humanitarian information unit, but may not necessarily reflect
the views of the United Nations. For further information, free sub-
scriptions, or to change your keywords, contact e-mail:
irin@ocha.unon.org or Web: http://www.reliefweb.int/IRIN . If you re-
print, copy, archive or re-post this item, please retain this credit
and disclaimer. Reposting by commercial sites requires written IRIN
permission.] Copyright (c) UN Office for the Coordination of Humani-
tarian Affairs 2001
--
Send mail for the `AFRO-NETS' conference to `<afro-nets@usa.healthnet.org>'.
Mail administrative requests to `<majordomo@usa.healthnet.org>'.
For additional assistance, send mail to: `<owner-afro-nets@usa.healthnet.org>'.