Cholera outbreak leaves 14 dead in northeastern Nigeria

Most of the victims belong to a camp for internally displaced people, who are trying to escape Boko Haram violence. The total number of suspected cholera cases in the country stands at 186, according to the health ministry.

Refugees wait on top of a truck in the Muna Garage area in the northeastern Nigerian city of Maiduguri, Nigeria, February 16, 2017.
Reuters

Refugees wait on top of a truck in the Muna Garage area in the northeastern Nigerian city of Maiduguri, Nigeria, February 16, 2017.

Fourteen people have died of cholera in northeast Nigeria, with most of the victims living in a camp for people displaced by Boko Haram violence, the health ministry said Saturday.     

“Up to September 1, 14 deaths have been reported,” the health ministry said in a statement.

It said “the total number of suspected cholera cases stands at 186.”

Most of the suspected cases and deaths are in Muna Garage, a camp for displaced people on the outskirts of Maiduguri, the capital of Borno - which is the epicenter of the Boko Haram insurgency.

The other victims come from neighbouring districts.

Nigeria’s government and NGOs are now working to improve sanitation, including better water purification and installing extra latrines, in a bid to prevent new cases, the statement said.

The city of Maiduguri has doubled in size since the start of the conflict with Boko Haram some eight years ago, rising to some two million inhabitants due to influxes of displaced people from across Borno state.

 The fighting has left some 20,000 people dead and displaced some 2.6 million in the country’s northeast.

Many of these displaced people are now living in camps where they lack sufficient food and are at risk of diseases like malaria.

Route 6