A measles crisis is mounting in South Sudan’s Western Equatoria state, as health authorities continue to battle an outbreak of yellow fever.
More than 12,000 measles cases have been recorded so far this year in the country, according to medical charity Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF).
“We went to Western Equatoria to support the intervention in yellow fever outbreak. However, we started seeing so many cases of measles coming to those facilities, and therefore we had to start supporting measles cases as well,” MSF head of mission Zakaria Mwatia told TRT Afrika.
“In a span of one week we have already seen more than 460 cases of measles,” he adds.
The head of mission explaining that MSF has had to double the bed capacity in some of three facilities to manage the influx of patients.
Since February, 7 deaths from measles among children under-five have been recorded, MSF said. It discovered that about 90% of the infected children have never been vaccinated against the disease.
Source link : https://trtafrika.com/africa/south-sudan-measles-yellow-fever-outbreaks-collide-17548838
Author :
Publish date : 2024-03-28 07:00:00
Copyright for syndicated content belongs to the linked Source.
