Mia being appraised of progress made
* Opened all the disconnected kiosks and schools taps who were owing Blantyre Water Board in bill arrears
* The mutual overdraft arrangement will assist people in low density areas in accessing safe and clean water
By Victor Singano Jnr, Correspondent
Minister of Water & Sanitation, Abida Mia has expressed satisfaction with measures put in place by Blantyre Water Board (BWB) which are aimed at combating cholera outbreak in the city.
Advertisement
On Thursday, the Minister toured BWB offices to appreciate effort being made by the water supply institution regarding to the cholera situation which has hit some parts of the city and she also visited Zingwangwa Health Centre and other water kiosks — to assess availability of clean and safe Water.
She thus said she was very impressed with the measures set by BWB in making sure that people are using safe water and also applauded management “for opening all the disconnected kiosks and schools taps who were owing Blantyre Water Board in bill arrears”.
She said the mutual overdraft arrangement will assist people in low density areas in accessing safe and clean water in order to ensure cholera situation is contained.
Accompanying BWB management was its Board chairperson, Joe Ching’ani, who said the institution is doing all it can through various interventions to make sure they mitigate the cholera pandemic within the city.
“Currently, we have placed a repayment holiday for arrears for all the kiosks that owed us huge bills, providing some overdraft to other kiosks in the region of K2 million as well as provision of chlorine to a number of communities that are in our catchment area, just to mention a few. All these have done in order to make Blantyre cholera-free,” Ching’ani said.
Advertisement
As of Wednesday, Blantyre’s cumulative figure as of Wednesday is at 5,300 that included 176 deaths while the national situation report from the Presidential Taskforce on CoVID-19 & Cholera indicated that the country registered 663 new cases accompanied by 29 deaths — recorded in Lilongwe (16); Machinga (5); two each in Blantyre and Neno and one each in Dedza, Thyolo, Chiradzulu and Dowa.
This brings the cumulative figure of confirmed cases reported since the onset of the outbreak at 35,580 with deaths at 1,162 — at case fatality rate of 3.27%.
A total of 33,321 people have recovered and as of Wednesday, 1,187 patients were in treatment centres.
Mangochi leads in most cases recorded at 6,845 with 113 deaths, followed by Blantyre (5,311/176 deaths); Lilongwe (5,254/318); Salima (2,681/69); Balaka (2,202/61); Nkhata Bay (1,514/44); Machinga (1,471/59); Nkhotakota (1,305/53); Dedza (1,175/49); Rumphi (1,047/17).
In three digits are Karonga (934/25); Dowa (891/23); Chiradzulu (754/30); Thyolo (646/18); Mulanje (552/25) and Mzimba North (470/2).
Advertisement
Meanwhile, the Taskforce takes note that some family members taking care of cholera patients have gone on to contract the disease — thus appeals to all guardians to always wash hands thoroughly with soap and safe water after touching patients or their beddings, clothes as well as c handling and cleaning up their stool and vomit.
They are also asked not to wash a sick persons beddings or clothes in a water source and to avoid direct contact of patients’ stool and vomits.
“The fluids should be thrown in a latrine and the items used to carry the wastes should be carefully cleaned and disinfected.
“Always make sure that a sick person’s clothes and beddings are disinfected with a chlorine solution (0.2%) and if chlorine is not available, they should be disinfected by stirring for 5 minutes in boiling water and drying in direct sunlight or by washing with soap thoroughly and drying in direct sunlight.”—Additional reporting by Duncan Mlanjira, Maravi Express
Advertisement