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AFP - Getty Images
Miriam Rodriguez shows a picture of her late son Ubaldo Pino -- who died of cholera on Jan. 6 -- on Jan. 15, 2013 in Havana. The official newspaper Granma announced Tuesday a cholera outbreak has allegedly sickened 51 people in Havana.
Cuban authorities are scrambling to contain a cholera outbreak that has sickened dozens of people in Havana, the capital city of 2.2 million residents and a popular tourism destination.
In a brief communiqué issued on Tuesday, the Health Ministry said the outbreak was first detected on Jan. 6, and was being contained.
"Fifty-one cases have been confirmed to date," the statement read, without mentioning fatalities.
"Due to the measures adopted, transmission is in the phase of extinction," it said.
But in off-the-record discussions with a ministry official and doctor directly involved in fighting the outbreak, a different picture emerged with hundreds of suspected cases.
They said the first cases were traced to a baseball game at the Latin American Stadium in the Cerro municipality of the Cuban capital, where fans come from all parts of the city to watch their team, the Industriales, play.
"We know what happened. Either the pork sandwiches or Tan Rico soda pop was contaminated at a game earlier this month," the official said.
"Even some of the baseball players became sick," she added.
The Health Ministry statement said the outbreak had begun in Cerro and "later spread to other municipalities in the capital."
Tens of thousands of tourists are visiting Havana, but there have been no reports of foreigners catching the illness.
Community clinics and family doctors are on high alert and giving out instructions to prevent the disease, transportation hubs have passengers sterilizing their shoes before leaving town and eateries are being systematically inspected and sometimes closed, residents say.
The official said Havana had been preparing to fight the disease since Cuba's first cholera outbreak in decades last year in eastern Granma province.
There have been scattered cases since then, but all were traced to the Granma area and quickly contained, she said.
"This time is different. There are many cases, but we are well prepared in terms of supplies and the protocol," she said, adding, "let's just hope we can stop this before it becomes much worse."
'Army' of health personnel
Martica, a Culture Ministry employee, tells a tale typical of the stories circulating around the city.
"There is this young man who often buys a milkshake around the corner from the office building where I work. He comes to the cafeteria and eats lunch with his girlfriend," she said.
"Last week he was hospitalized with cholera and an army from the Health Ministry descended upon the area and my building, handing out penicillin, checking the water supply, closing snack shops and questioning residents and workers," she said.
The lack of official information until Tuesday has led to rumors that dozens have died in the Cuban capital, though the official and doctor said there had been only one fatality.
Three Havana hospitals have been designated to handle cholera cases - one for adults, another for children and a third for pregnant women.
Another doctor working at the designated adult hospital, the Center for Tropical Medicine, said they were swamped during the weekend with suspected cases.
Cholera is generally not fatal, but can kill in just a few hours when diarrhea and vomiting cause dehydration, especially among the elderly.
The illness runs its course within a week, making it relatively easy to track, but at the same time is highly contagious, spreading from hand to mouth, through contaminated food and the water supply.
"So far there is no indication it's in the water supply, but we are dumping more chlorine in the system," the Health Ministry official said.
Until 2012, there had been no cholera outbreaks reported in Cuba since well before the 1959 revolution and the creation of a national health system by the Communist government.
Hundreds of Cuban doctors and nurses have worked for more than a decade in Haiti, which has battled a cholera outbreak that has killed more than 7,000 people since that country's 2010 earthquake.
Cuba lies closer to Haiti than any other Caribbean country, with the exception of the Dominican Republic, which shares the island of Hispaniola with the crisis stricken country and has reported more than 20,000 cholera cases and 350 deaths since the Haiti epidemic began.
Copyright 2013 Thomson Reuters. Click for restrictions.
Leave a Comment:
Just look at Cuba and you can see where Obama wants to take us.
The common man wouldn't post such idiotic and juvenile statements for everyone to see. It would be a wise decision on your part to consider a name change.
@Annie-322924
Don't Laugh..
Ahh, Michel Moore's paridise.
touchdown and extra point, very good observation......cuba si yankee no....kidding aside this is a scary story
Any country could have an outbreak of disease, see this recent cases here in the US, all reported by our own CDC:
http://www.cdc.gov/hai/outbreaks/meningitis.html
http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dvbid/westnile/index.htm
http://www.cdc.gov/ecoli/2012/O145-06-12/index.html
Well,
the first thing Obama must do is to close the Guantamo prison and then the
right thing to do is to give back that property to the owner, Cuba. How can we criticize
the Cuban government when the USA is illegally occupying part of their land?
May they get this under control quickly.
Hope not .
no you know why they lifted there travel visa's....lets spread the grems around...
Depending on where people have come from, this can quickly spread before people have a chance to even realize what is happening.The government would do their best to not let the public know the extent of the infection.However, being highly contagious, it is crucial people take steps to keep from getting it.
Let's hope it doesn't get out of hand. Otherwise, it can spread like wildfire.Being especially lethal for the very young and old.Americans have no idea just how ugly this disease really is, since there hasn't been any major outbreaks since 1911.Though a few cases appear each year.
With the introduction of chlorine to our water supply, improved water delivery system/waste disposal and antibiotics, it has made this disease virtually unheard of to generations of Americans. So I am hoping this outbreak will be contained and not spread to outside areas beyond what those in the medical fields are already covering.
I guess this does not help Cuba's claims about its public health and sanitation systems. Hopefully, this outbreak does not become an epidemic. It would utterly devastate the population.
Any country could have an outbreak of disease, see this recent cases here in the US, all reported by our own CDC:
http://www.cdc.gov/hai/outbreaks/meningitis.html
http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dvbid/westnile/index.htm
http://www.cdc.gov/ecoli/2012/O145-06-12/index.html
Nitwit. Cuba has a very good medical system. Cubans outlife Americans by 2 years. Of all things started by Che, the present Cuban medical system was probably his ownly success. Very likely the disease was brought back from Haiti. Cuban doctors are very good and travel all over the world to very poor countries helping them.
That is the funniest thing I have heard in quite some time! Tell me another one!
The WHO ranks Cuba as #39 word wide.
Not "great" - until you consider that the US is ranked as #37.
harry, you pretend but your use of spelling gives you away.....the mortality rate in cuba is skewed by terminations of potential bad pregnancies, the average two years life expectancy is a lie unless of course you include guantanamo bay where the American's extend the lives of enemy combatants.
Harry, you forgot to add:
... and the world is made of marshmellows la la la la la
Annie
The left in the U.S. idolizes Castro and his wonderful health care. Cholera anyone?
I think you'd be hard pressed to find more than a handful of people in the U.S. that "idolize" Castro. There are more than few morons wearing Che t-shirts, but they likely don't know the first thing about what he did during and after the revolution.
Any country could have an outbreak of disease, see this recent cases here in the US, all reported by our own CDC:
http://www.cdc.gov/hai/outbreaks/meningitis.html
http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dvbid/westnile/index.htm
http://www.cdc.gov/ecoli/2012/O145-06-12/index.html
Cholera comes from drinking filthy water. Ohhh the marvels of the Obama system in Cuba where they can't clean up their water but have a marvelous health care system to deal with the corpses.
Any country could have an outbreak of disease, see this recent cases here in the US, all reported by our own CDC:
http://www.cdc.gov/hai/outbreaks/meningitis.html
http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dvbid/westnile/index.htm
http://www.cdc.gov/ecoli/2012/O145-06-12/index.html
Viva El Presidente Obama! Viva la Revolucion!
one nico to another; very good
obozo needs to go visit.
Pestilences were foretold to ravage the world.
I was very surprised to read that "cholera is generally not fatal." If it isn't fatal, why were there outbreaks of it in which thousands died? The article should have read, "cholera is generally not fatal if properly treated, but if left untreated has a mortality rate of 50-60%."
AHHHHH! No problemos..just have the group of doctors that took care of Chavez's cancer work on this, there will be a solution fast. Take the samples and run it into your high tech lab and I'm sure you'll figure it out. Bottom line is Castro lives in riches and his nation lives in Cholera. I can see the parade of 1950 Pontiac's racing to the scene to take samples with "Health Techs getting out of the cars, with sears and Roebuck testing equipment.
Any country could have an outbreak of disease, see this recent cases here in the US, all reported by our own CDC:
http://www.cdc.gov/hai/outbreaks/meningitis.html
http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dvbid/westnile/index.htm
http://www.cdc.gov/ecoli/2012/O145-06-12/index.html
Trouble in the "worker's paradise"? Yes, here it is, the dictatorship of the proletariat--just as promised. Priceless.
Any country could have an outbreak of disease, see this recent cases here in the US, all reported by our own CDC:
http://www.cdc.gov/hai/outbreaks/meningitis.html
http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dvbid/westnile/index.htm
http://www.cdc.gov/ecoli/2012/O145-06-12/index.html
Fact and to the point Justin. But most of the writers here on MSNBC are trained to write sensational stories in which we leave out the heart of the story, because that may be too "sleepy" and then there would be very few comments on their pages. News on my end say that some of the writers for MS have gotten huge back patting for stories that have garnered 8 pages of comments in the first day.....consider that one.
Politics aside, romilio is right. Add the ongoing 1 million HIV/AIDS outbreak in the US, then other outbreaks...not a perfect place, but better than some.
More to the point is the need for worldwide cooperation during any and all disease outbreaks. Political motivated comments regarding this particular subject do nothing for the suffering humans.
Wow, there is hope for understanding. Thanks Pedro.
I bet Hugo Chavez brought cholera to Cuba with him from his own country.
I wonder what the TSA is doing to prevent infected people from entering this country with the disease?
Well,
the first thing Obama must do is to close the Guantamo prison and then the
right thing to do is to give back that property to the owner, Cuba. How can we criticize
the Cuban government when the USA is illegally occupying part of their land?
The Cubans are fighting an outbreak of cholera and the USA has an embargo against
Cuba, that prohibits any country in the world to export medicines for their
people. How can we be so wrong?