Muanda, April 18th, 2025 (CPA) – Four (4) deaths, 9 recoveries and one escaped patient out of 15 cases of cholera have been recorded in the rural health zone of Muanda in Kongo Central, in the south-west of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), the CPA learnt on Thursday from a health source. « The statistics show that 15 people have been affected, most of them local fishermen and traffickers from the Muanda territory who come from the islets of the river separating the DRC and Angola on its south-west border at Muanda. There have been four deaths, including two patients who were brought back dead and two others who died two days later at the treatment center, as well as 9 recoveries and one patient who escaped », said Dr Jérôme Zifuakala Ndombasi, Acting Zone Medical Officer for the Muanda rural health zone. These statistics were revealed at the end of a working session between the Mwanda health zone and the provincial health minister for Central Kongo, Ovide Yobila Nuambote, who was on a mission to this coastal zone to strengthen response strategies. The report from the meeting of doctors, nurses and paramedical staff involved in the response to this resurgent epidemic revealed that the borders on the Congo River coast do not have adequate health control systems. « We have already organized several strategic meetings with the local authority to find out how to contain the epidemic and avoid the worst. We are raising awareness among the head nurses at the health posts and among the general public through media programs, to teach them about the barriers to cholera prevention », said the zone’s chief medical officer. ‘We would like the State to come to our aid with a lot of chlorine and physiological serum, as well as the working materials we need to deal with the epidemic,’ he pleaded.
The provincial Minister of Health, who was present at the meeting, promised to ask the provincial governor to strengthen the capacity of response workers in the Muanda rural health zone in order to put an end to the epidemic. This cholera epidemic, which is resurfacing nine years later in the rural health zone of Muanda, is the result of the proximity of the border with Angola via the islets close to the Angolan province of Soyo, where fishermen and other traffickers spend days in poor sanitary and environmental conditions, as well as the lack of assiduous health checks at the peripheral borders. ACP/