Typhoid cases reported in the south

Twenty-six confirmed cases of typhoid have been reported in the southern Kyrgyz province of Batken, which is seen by Kyrgyz health experts as a probable extension of a recent outbreak of the disease in neighbouring Tajikistan. "There are 26 confirmed cases of typhoid in the Batken Province as of today," Elena Bayalinova, the head of the Kyrgyz health ministry's press centre told IRIN from the capital, Bishkek on Thursday. "However, it is not a question of epidemic yet," she added, noting that the infection was contracted as a result of contacts among local people. She also said that Kyrgyz epidemiologists noted that the recent cases were related to a typhoid outbreak in neighbouring Tajikistan. The health ministry said in a statement on Thursday that according to the Kyrgyz sanitary inspection department, 58 patients had been suspected of having contracted typhoid in 17 villages in Batken district and were hospitalised starting from September. Of the total, 26 cases had been confirmed. According to health officials, no patients with suspected cases of typhoid had been hospitalised since 23 October, and treatment of the 26 patients with the disease was continuing in the infectious diseases unit of the Batken provincial hospital. An analysis of the epidemiological situation had showed that most of the patients with confirmed cases of typhoid - 21 in all - were residents of border villages close to Tajikistan, the health ministry said, adding that the situation with regard to typhoid in those areas of Tajikistan bordering Batken region remained poor. Local people in the villages with the highest number of typhoid cases were said to be drinking water from irrigation ditches coming from Tajikistan; they also had close contacts with Tajik border villages due to a bazaar in the Tajik village of Liakkan. Authorities are taking the necessary steps in an effort to contain the outbreak. "We have a centre of epidemiologists, which has immediately started its operations," Bayalinova said. Health officials were also calling on households to identify contact persons, coupled with education activities in order to raise the awareness of local people about the disease. Asked about further assistance they needed, Bayalinova said international organisations could help in terms of equipment for laboratory analysis, as well as in organising some training seminars for local epidemiologists, along with leaflets and other published materials on the prevention of the disease. Her comments follow a serious outbreak of the disease recently in the Tajik capital, Dushanbe, in which hundreds of cases have been confirmed. Health officials, however, told IRIN that the situation there was now under control. According to the World Health Organisation, typhoid is contracted when people eat food or drink water infected with Salmonella typhosa. Generally recognised by the sudden onset of sustained fever, severe headache, nausea and severe loss of appetite, typhoid is sometimes accompanied by a hoarse cough and constipation or diarrhoea. Case-fatality rates of 10 percent can be reduced to less than 1 percent with appropriate antibiotic therapy. Paratyphoid fever shows similar symptoms, but tends to be milder and the case-fatality rate is much lower. The annual occurrence of typhoid fever is estimated at 17 million cases, with approximately 600,000 deaths. Some strains of Salmonella typhosa are resistant to antibiotics.