ICDDR,B team reaches Sierra Leone to tackle cholera outbreak

An ICDDR,B emergency response team reached Sierra Leone Thursday to work with the World Health Organisation (WHO), which is tackling a cholera outbreak that has so far killed over 230 people and is threatening the lives of thousands more, reports UNB.

The ICDDR,B team consists of Dr Pradip K Bardhan, chief physician of the Dhaka Hospital, Dr Azharul Islam Khan, chief physician and head of Diarrhoeal Diseases Unit and Dr M Sirajul Islam, environmental microbiologist and head of Environmental Microbiology Lab in ICDDR,B' s Centre for Food and Waterborne Diseases, said an ICDDR,B press release.

They will join other international experts working closely with Sierra Leone's Ministry of Health to develop early detection programmes and train local health care providers in case management and reporting.

In recent weeks, cholera has spread rapidly through Sierra Leone's capital, Freetown, where heavy rains, overcrowded living conditions and poor sanitation have left thousands of people sick with acute watery diarrhoea.

Only two of the country's 12 districts remain unaffected by the epidemic. The WHO estimates that the number of cases could reach 32,000, with the outbreak peaking towards the end of September.

With growing expertise, the ICDDR,B has extended assistance to help manage cholera outbreaks in the past to other countries. Since 1994, ICDDR,B teams have been travelling widely to help fight the disease, from Rwandan refugee camps in what is now the Democratic Republic of the Congo, to Pakistan and Zimbabwe.