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Amuru, Uganda | THE INDEPENDENT | At least 3,500 Ugandan nationals from Elegu Town Council in Amuru district have received cholera vaccines in neighbouring South Sudan as the local authorities make strides to contain the transmission of the highly contagious diarrheal disease.
The cross-border vaccination drive was coordinated between Amuru district health authorities and their counterparts in Nimule Hospital in Nimule Town, South Sudan. The move comes amidst what health authorities and local leaders in the district describe as the Health Ministry’s “silence” on the outbreak of cholera in the district, coupled with limited resources to curb the cholera outbreak.
Amuru district has been battling cholera since July 2, which has so far claimed the lives of five people (four from Bibia Health Centre III and one from Nimule Hospital in Nimule Town).
Patrick Louis Lamot, the Cross Border Focal Point Person at Elegu Port Health, said Monday that the vaccination drive is aimed at averting further importation or exportation of public health threats through the borders.
Lamot said they had numerous cross-border engagements with their counterparts in Nimule Town, adding that the two sides both resolved joint collaborate to combat all emerging Public Health threats of international concern.
Port Health Elegu collaborated with the South Sudan Nimule Health team to share key information and jointly devise strategies to curb further spread of the infections. One of the strategies was cholera vaccination, and so when the vaccines were supplied to Nimule Port Health, they shared the information, which we extended to the communities to benefit from,” said Lamot.
Lamot, however, noted that they have yet to assess whether the drop in the Cholera cases between August 2nd to 6th was closely linked to the vaccination drive.
“We are yet to assess whether the drop in cases in the earlier weeks (August 2nd to 6th) was directly linked to many people receiving the cholera vaccines or was due to any other factor. But in general, quite a number of our cross-border population went and accessed the vaccines from Nimule,” Lamot told URN in an interview.
So far, 50 cases of cholera have been confirmed through laboratory tests at Gulu Regional Referral, while more than 200 tested positive for the disease through Rapid Diagnostic Test (RDT), according to health officials.
Milton Okello, the In-charge of Bibia Health Centre III, which is at the front line of the Cholera fight, told URN Monday that the cases of the disease had started spiking up following the recent floods that hit Elegu Town Council.
He noted that 15 people had been admitted to the health facility with acute diarrheal infection and were undergoing medical treatment. According to Okello, since the outbreak of the disease on July 2 this year, so far 300 people have been discharged after receiving treatment for diarrheal complications from Bibia Health Centre III.
Amuru district cholera taskforce in a frantic move to raise resources last month, unveiled a 913.2 million shillings draft response budget for the cholera fight. The funds, once secured, would support the district case management, surveillance, sensitisation, and welfare of frontline health workers at Bibia Health Centre III.
Despite the leaders in Amuru district faulting the Health Ministry for being silent about the outbreak, Dr Jane Ruth Aceng, the Health Minister, during a parliamentary session on July 31, noted that the Ministry had dispatched assorted medical supplies to contain the cholera situation.
Dr Aceng also said a team of health officials from the Ministry, backed by Ministry of Water officials had taken water samples from Elegu Town Council for medical tests to ascertain the quality of water being used by the residents.
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