WHO gives Tanzania medical supplies to check spread of cholera

The World Health Organization (WHO) on Friday donated medical supplies worth 100,000 U.S. dollars to the government of Tanzania to help check the spread of the deadly cholera disease.

"The decision to increase medical equipment to the health workers in the cholera treatment camps is one of the best ways to help save lives of the victims," WHO representative to Tanzania Rufaro Chatora told a news conference in the East African nation's commercial capital Dar es Salaam.

Until Monday, nine deaths due to cholera had been confirmed in Dar es-Salaam, Morogoro and Coast regions, with 426 patients being admitted at various hospitals in Dar es Salaam.

Coast region authorities closed down a primary school after one of the pupils was killed by the deadly disease.

Chatora appealed to the Ministry of Health and Social Welfare to embark on a mass-awareness campaign to help educate the public on the basic sanitation practices as a preventive measure.

He handed over 1,000 carton boxes of sanitizers and 24,000 U.S. dollars to Donnan Mmbando, the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Health.

The WHO envoy urged medical authorities to work swiftly in dealing with the epidemic before it escalated into a major national catastrophe.

Mmbando said that the medical supplies offered by WHO would be distributed to health facilities located in the most affected areas of the city.