The cholera outbreak in the Mozambican province of Nampula has infected almost a thousand people since October, triggering nearly 400 new cases since the end of February, in addition to 30 deaths, according to official data.
According to health authorities, the province, in northern Mozambique, had 579 accumulated cases from October to the end of February, with 29 deaths, in three districts, a number that in this week’s report grew to a total of 929 infected people and one more death.
In a report by the National Institute for Disaster Risk Management and Reduction (INGD), with data up to March 11, given the consequences of the passage of tropical cyclone Jude through Nampula province this week, it is said that the cholera outbreak is now active, locally, in Mogovolas, in the city of Nampula, in Murrupula and Larde.
“Risk factors include poor water supply coverage, poor sanitation, failure to comply with basic individual and collective hygiene measures, and misinformation about the disease,” reads the same information, which adds that the Health sector in Nampula, as well as the Government and partners, is “developing actions to contain the spread of the outbreak.”
Health authorities in Nampula province expressed concern about a week ago about the level of misinformation about cholera, an outbreak that has affected the province since 2024, after the vandalism of yet another treatment center for the disease.
“We had our cholera treatment center vandalized [in the Murrupula district], fortunately they didn’t vandalize the tents (…), but what worried us most is the level of misinformation we have at the district level,” said the district health director in Murrupula, Énia Zunguza, on March 7.
The cholera outbreak was declared on October 17 in three regions of Nampula province and Zambezia province.
According to the sector representative, health professionals are prohibited from going to communities, which creates insecurity among the class and prevents treatment of the disease.
“No one is safe because the information circulating in communities is that health services are spreading this cholera, which is not true,” he said.
Nampula health authorities had already admitted in February that myths and misinformation were compromising the cholera vaccination target in Mogovolas, one of the most affected districts in that northern province.
The authorities intended to reach 197,999 people, but ended up vaccinating 169,865, which corresponds to 85.8%, Samuel Carlos, representative of the Provincial Health Service in Nampula, told Lusa at the time.
Due to the wave of misinformation, with communities accusing health technicians in the field of spreading the disease, people in Mogovolas destroyed the Cholera Treatment Center, as well as the surgical center of the Government’s strategic partner, the non-governmental organization Doctors Without Borders.
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