THE City of Bulawayo has recorded a drop in diarrhoea cases to 317 cases in March as compared to 396 cases in the previous month.
This is revealed in the latest council minutes on public health surveillance, epidemiology and emergency management.
Health services director Edwin Sibanda said the province had implemented enhanced emergency response mechanisms across all pillars to detect, contain, monitor, predict and manage disease outbreaks as they continued to evolve.
He said the city had remained on high alert for the 12 adverse events such as Ebola in the Democratic Republic of Congo; Marburg Virus in Rwanda, Tanzania and Equatorial Guinea; multi-country outbreak of M-pox virus (Clades 1 & 2); wild poliovirus type 1 outbreak in Malawi and Mozambique (Tete province), cholera outbreak in Malawi, Zambia and Zimbabwe (all Provinces) and South Africa; typhoid, endemic in neighbouring cities in Zimbabwe; measles; food poisoning, mumps, chickenpox (VZV), Covid-19 globally and the GIT disease in Bulawayo.
The local authority noted that the region remained on high alert due to the presence of cases in non-endemic countries and neighbouring regions.
“Six imported suspected malaria cases were reported compared to 15 cases from the previous month. Three hundred and seventeen diarrhoea cases and three diarrhoea related deaths were reported compared to 396 cases from the previous month,” the minutes read.
“The most affected age groups had been the under-fives. One dysentery case was reported compared to 14 cases from the previous month.
“Fifty-one dog bite cases were reported compared to 84 from the previous month and 30% of the dogs were vaccinated, while 53% had unknown vaccination status.”
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The council said dog bites were a serious public health concern.
“Six snakebite cases and one snakebite-related death were reported compared to 15 cases from the previous month,” the council said.
“Ninety-three acute malnutrition cases were reported compared to 60 cases from the previous month, a serious public health concern.”
