Zimbabwe is facing a massive health crisis as both cholera and anthrax threaten a under-nourished population living in a landscape of decaying infrastructure, according to a Melburnian working in Africa. Three people have died from an anthrax outbreak in western Zimbabwe, while the government has responded to a national cholera outbreak which has already killed 500 people by turning off Harare's public water supplies.
Meanwhile, the Reserve of Bank of Zimbabwe has announced it will release new $10 million, $50 million and $100 million notes to ensure people can carry enough money with them.
Aid agencies are bracing themselves for more illnesses because starving Zimbabweans are eating anthrax-infected meat and the annual flooding season could soon start pushing cholera-infected water across the country. Matt Cochrane, a Fitzroy man currently working in South Africa as the communications manager for Red Cross International told The Age that Zimbabwe's population was too under-nourished and the public health system so close to collapse that thousands of people could die from cholera.
"We have already got a situation where there is a massive cholera outbreak and it is only going to get worse with the arrival of the rain, particularly when there is no public water and there is very little public health care available," Mr Cochrane said. The World Health Organisation has reported 11,000 cholera infections across Zimbabwe and estimates up to 500 people have already died from the water-borne disease. The cholera outbreak started in August and recently spread to South Africa.
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http://www.theage.com.au/world/thousands-could-die-cholera-anthrax-threaten-zimbabwe-20081204-6qzu.html?page=-1
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