In Côte d’Ivoire, the health authorities want to reassure: the spread of the mysterious disease which affects a village in the center of the country has been stopped or in any case identified. Since December, 53 people have been suffering from convulsions, vomiting and diarrhoea.
With our correspondent in Abidjan, Bineta Diagne
Sixteen people have died from the disease, mostly children, according to the Ministry of Health, but today Ivorian authorities say the disease is under control.
Teams from the National Institute of Public Hygiene collected water samples, took samples from shops and cashew apples consumed by children who fell ill. The analyzes show the presence of a germ contained in the water of the broth of a chicken which served as a fetish during a ceremony organized twice in the village of Kpo Kahandro.
” The main bacterium that was in the broth is a bacterium called Clostridium. It is the most virulent of all clostridia and it only takes a few nanograms of toxin to show clinical signs. », explained Mireille Dosso, director of the Institut Pasteur.
For the Minister of Health, there is therefore no mysterious disease. Pierre Dimba calls for vigilance regarding the products offered by witch doctors. ” What we deplore is that these are not isolated acts. More and more, in our villages, we devote ourselves to the adoration of a lot of ecological niches that they ignore, with sellers of illusions who come to the villages and who promise mountains and sky. It would therefore be necessary, that from this case, the population is vigilant. I don’t even want them to love these things, but if they do, you still have to make sure that what’s available to them is something you can manipulate. “, did he declare.
According to the Minister, 24 hospitalized people were able to return to the village, a sign, according to his teams, that ” evil is under control “.