Doctors alert for a possible cholera outbreak in summer season (in Iraq)

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

BAGHDAD, 25 May 2005 (IRIN) - Health experts in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, warned of a possible cholera outbreak this summer, saying they have seen an increase in cases so far this year and called for urgent action to prevent it from spreading.

Dr Duraid al-Khatoon, a paediatrician at the Children’s Teaching Hospital in the capital, told IRIN that as of January 2005 at least one case of cholera in children has been reported every day and that 90 percent of the cases were living in suburbs where sewage treatment is non-existent. He added that last year less than 10 cases were reported by the hospital monthly, representing a three-fold increase in the disease.

“We have entered the summer season and the water and sewage treatment in Baghdad still requires urgent repair. Children are developing cholera from these sources and all my patients are being told not to drink water unless it has been boiled and to keep children from playing in streets,” al-Khatoon added.

Cholera is an acute diarrhoeal disease caused by the bacterium Vibrio cholerae. A person can become infected by consuming water or food contaminated with the bacterium. Common sources of infection are raw or poorly cooked seafood, raw fruit and vegetables or other food that has been contaminated during preparation or storage.

http://electroniciraq.net/news/1979.shtml

[Career Prole]

1. "How 'bout some plague and pestilence on top of everything else?

How ya likin' freedom so far, Iraq?"

" They are cheering, Mr. President. That 'Down with America...down with Bush!' chant is a colloquialism which means, ummm...they're 'down' with us...they understand us. It means they 'dig' where you're coming from, sir."

[IntiRaymi]

2. just great

If a cholera outbreak happens, it might make the invasion's human cost seem like small potatoes. I was in South America at the time of the cholera outbreak in Peru (1991). That country was not beset by a civil war like Iraq is, and had the ability to implement policies. But, by the time it ended, it had claimed over 10 000 dead out of a million infected.
http://www.cfsan.fda.gov/~mow/chap7.html
If treatment had not been available, a greater percentage of those million infected would have died. Up to, in the absurd extreme, a million dead. Cholera is a scourge, and if Iraq is hit by it, we will be looking at a true humanitarian disaster, with the USA directly responsible for it.