An IOM operation to assist 4,000 vulnerable
displaced Dinkas return home from Juba to Bor on board an IOM
chartered ferry up the White Nile has been temporarily suspended
because of an outbreak of acute watery diarrhoea in the regional
capital Juba and in the neighbouring town of Yei.
According to the World Health Organization in
Sudan, the outbreak has so far claimed 27 lives and has infected
more than 1,300 people. In consultation with UN and the government,
IOM has decided to suspend the return operation that had already
taken 800 vulnerable Dinkas to Bor in order to avoid a spread of
the disease.
So far, vibrio cholera has been confirmed on
11 February from a stool sample tested in the National Public
Health Laboratory in Khartoum.
IOM is also part of the efforts to contain the
spread of acute watery diarrhoea. At the way station in Juba where
more than 3,000 of the remaining vulnerable Dinkas are, IOM has
been managing the set-up of a quarantined area, which include
latrines provided by UNICEF.
IOM also hired workers to set up an ICRC
donated hospital tent and has four of its medical staff involved in
the return operation now supporting the non-governmental
organization (NGO) Medair which is managing the case treatment
centre at the way station.
"We will also be organising medical
evacuations to the hospital in Juba on request," said IOM's Mark
Petzoldt, who is in Juba. "The atmosphere here is calm and there is
no panic. Obviously the Dinkas here are very disappointed at not
being able to join the others in Bor, but they are being looked
after well by all the agencies involved here."
As soon as the operation to take the Dinkas to
Bor can resume, IOM will be able to return 900 people at a time by
doubling its ferry capacity. A second ferry has been chartered with
an additional deck.
For further information, please contact:
Mark Petzoldt
IOM Juba
Tel: +882 166 7000 260