Health Cabinet Secretary Mutahi Kagwe has announced a cholera outbreak in Kamukunji Constituency in Nairobi County.
Speaking on Thursday, May 5, Kagwe alerted Nairobi residents to observe high standards of hygiene after health officials noted that there was an outbreak.
He, however, did not disclose the number of reported cases but he attributed the outbreak to the failure of Kenyans to adhere to simple hygienic measures such as hand washing.
“Because sanitizing is out in some cases because people are no longer wearing masks and so on, cholera is back in case you didn't know. We have a bit of an outbreak of cholera in Kamukunji," Kagwe stated.
"I have absolutely no doubt at the height of the Covid-19, there would have been no cholera because everyone would have been washing their hands and sanitizing,” he added.
The last time Nairobi had a notable cholera outbreak was in 2019 when more than 10 cases of cholera were recorded in Nairobi.
Nairobi County Health Chief Officer Washington Makodingo stated that 14 patients were diagnosed with cholera symptoms and had been admitted to different hospitals in Nairobi.
“I can confirm that 14 cases of cholera have been reported in various health facilities with some of the patients having been treated and discharged,” Dr Makodingo stated while appearing before the Nairobi County Assembly Health Committee.
To curb the disease, the Nairobi health department distributed chlorine tablets to areas where cholera was reported.
Further, the department also gave antibiotics to those prone to cholera in order to lessen the burden of the disease. The county managed to distribute 50,000 antibiotic tablets.
Dr Makodingo stated that the county was liaising with the Nairobi City Water and Sewerage Company to super-chlorinate its water as well as establish cholera treatment units in all health facilities in the capital city.
