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LIBERIA: No relief as most Monrovians go without toilets

With just one in 25 Liberians having access to a toilet, most use the nearest bush or beach, unwittingly committing what the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) calls “the riskiest sanitation practice”. Liberia’s 3.5 million people share just 19,690 toilets, according to a government water and sanitation sector assessment from October 2008, and fewer than one in three Liberians have access to safe drinking water, according to the head of Liberia’s Water and Sewer Corporation, Hun-Bu Tulay. “Open...

DOSH Sensitise Imams on Good Hygiene and Sanitation

TheDepartment of State for Health and Social Welfare last Sunday sensitised over100 imams across the country on good hygiene practices and sanitation at the SupremeIslamic Council headquarters in Kanifing. Speaking atthe opening, Imam Momodou Lamin Touray, president of the Supreme IslamicCouncil, described the meeting as timely noting that the imams can play animportant role in the area of health information to the general public. Imam Tourayurged the imams to use their sermons in the various...

In the fight to save children’s lives, washing hands takes centre stage

First Global Handwashing Day 2008 celebrated worldwide Today marks the first ever Global Handwashing Day, celebrated in over 70 countries across five continents in an effort to mobilize and motivate millions around the world to wash their hands with soap. Handwashing with soap is one of the most effective and inexpensive ways to prevent diarrheal disease and pneumonia, which together are responsible for approximately 3.5 million child deaths every year. The United Nations General Assembly...

GUINEA-BISSAU: Cholera epidemic out of control

With 6,461 cholera cases and 122 deaths, experts say the cholera epidemic in Guinea-Bissau is out of control. The number of reported cases has doubled in the past three weeks. All of the country’s 11 health regions have been affected, including the remote Bijagos islands, 60 km off the Bissau coast, which have reported 158 cases. “At the moment, though measures are in place to deal with the epidemic, the situation is not under control,” said Daniel Remartinez, emergency coordinator of the...

Floods in West Africa raise major health risks

Rising flood waters across West Africa are intensifying health risks for millions of people, and adding to the impact of the food price crisis. International aid is needed as heavy rains forecast to last until September could exacerbate health threats for conditions including malaria, diarrhoea and other potentially fatal communicable diseases. "West Africa's annual floods bring with them not only the threat of vector-borne and communicable diseases, but it further endangers the lives of...

UGANDA: Poor hygiene fuelling Hepatitis in north

Bad hygiene and lack of adequate sanitation facilities in northern Uganda, a region still recovering from two decades of conflict, have fuelled the spread of the Hepatitis E viral infection in several districts, a senior official said. "The major challenges are inadequate access to safe water, unhygienic disposal of faeces, poor personal and domestic hygiene," Steven Malinga, the Health Minister, told IRIN on 7 August. The disease is spread along the faecal-oral route and outbreaks tend to be...

LIBERIA: Nutritional “crisis” in Monrovia

Moderate hunger hasbeen endemic in the Liberian capital for years, but as the effects of soaringglobal food and fuel prices have doubled rice prices, the aid agency ActionAgainst Hunger (ACF) says thousands of city children are increasingly at riskof acute malnutrition. ACF Head of Mission in Liberia, Berengere de Penanster,says a February 2008 survey showed “extremely disturbing” results thatindicated a “significant nutritional crisis” in the Liberian capital. "What we know and can't ignore...

KENYA: Cholera kills 40 in western region

At least 42 people have died in western Kenya following an outbreak of Cholera, health officials said. "At least 701 cases of the disease have been reported in the western province of Nyanza," SK Sharif, the senior deputy director of the area’s medical services, said on 2 April. The disease, which was initially reported in the districts of Rongo, Siaya and Suba in January, had spread to other districts in the region despite control measures. The most affected areas included the districts...

COTE D'IVOIRE: Clean up campaign for hospitals

Hygiene in most hospitals in Cote d’Ivoire is so low that the ministry of health has launched a nationwide clean-up campaign. “We hope to eliminate from our hospitals [bad] practices that add risks to patients’ health,” Health Minister Rémi Allah Kouadio told journalists at the campaign’s launch on 28 March in Abidjan. He said Ivorians are at “very great risk” of infection every time they seek medical treatment, although he also said that the extent to which facilities are contaminated has...

NAMIBIA: Too much rain is as bad as too little

Floodwater caused by heavy rains in Namibia's northern and northeastern regions has brought an outbreak of cholera, and is also being blamed for a lower than expected cereal harvest for 2008. The Namibian government declared a state of emergency on 5 March, while the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) said in its situation report on 13 March that conditions in the affected regions were "worsening": 72 cases of suspected cholera have been reported, of which 4 were confirmed and one was fatal. Cholera...