Suspected anthrax epidemic in Afar Region

Following a local alert that “hundreds” of people are reportedly dying from a “peculiar killer syndrome” in the Afar Region, northeastern Ethiopia, a report from the UN Emergencies Unit for Ethiopia (UN-EUE) warns there is an immediate need to “investigate, detect and confirm fears of an anthrax epidemic in Zones 4 and 5 of Afar Region... which appears likely to spread into Amhara Region and other areas of the country”. In an investigative mission in April, UN-EUE found 51 people in one village, Whama, had died in February and March alone. Health workers and doctors - including an MSF doctor operating in Dubti hospital - report an “unknown” fatal disease which includes swelling of the neck and cheeks and bloody diarrhoea.

Pastoralist Afars in Ethiopia, who share international borders with Eritrea and Djibouti, are suffering “persisting drought”, warns the report, made worse by the Ethiopia-Eritrean conflict which has displaced some 30,000 Afar people. Cross-border animal trading has ceased since the beginning of the conflict in 1998, which “represents a major cut back for the Afar economy”. Despite some rainfall in the region, the northernmost territory near the Eritrean border remains dry. The conflict has also restricted traditional drought-related migration.

Approximately 17,000 internally war-displaced Afars are in need of non-food relief items, reports the UN-EUE.