New death from hemorrhagic fever recorded in Iraq

MENA

Published: 2022-05-06 18:34

Last Updated: 2024-03-27 18:22


New death from hemorrhagic fever recorded in Iraq
New death from hemorrhagic fever recorded in Iraq

The Kirkuk Governorate in northern Iraq recorded on Friday a death from hemorrhagic fever, city officials announced, a day after Nineveh Governorate recorded the first cases of this disease, whose infections have recently increased in the country.

According to the latest statistics announced by the Iraqi Ministry of Health on April 30, the country recorded 24 cases of the viral disease, also known as Congo fever, most of them in the south, but the virus appeared in recent days in northern governorates as well. However, the disease is no longer widespread.

This is at least the sixth death in a month. And the death before the last was recorded in the central province of Babylon on April 29.

The Associate Director of Kirkuk Health Ziad Khalaf told AFP on Friday that the patient whose infection was recorded "last Sunday, died on Friday afternoon," adding that "a person was practicing indiscriminate slaughter."

Meanwhile, the province has taken strict measures to avoid new casualties, as Kirkuk Governor Rakan al-Jubouri announced to AFP.

He added that he had taken a decision "to prevent the entry and exit of livestock from Kirkuk, in addition to conducting sterilization and follow-up work for the area where the infection appeared a few days ago."

Also, "indiscriminate slaughter was completely prevented in Kirkuk and seven sterilization campaigns were carried out on livestock areas in the districts and sub-districts," he explained, adding that no new infections were recorded in the province.

However, the spokesman for the Ministry of Health, Saif Al-Badr, told AFP that the country is not witnessing "an outbreak. So far, the infections are limited, and every year we record infections and deaths, they were and still are limited." However, he added, "This year's rate is higher than last year, so we have intensified" prevention measures.

The Ministry of Health had said that the most vulnerable to infection are livestock breeders and butchers.

Dhi Qar Governorate in the south accounts for "70%" of the total infections, according to a statement made by the Director of Public Health, Abdul Amir Al-Halfi to the Iraqi News Agency. It is a poor governorate that raises livestock in many of its areas, such as cows, sheep, goats and buffaloes, which are considered a medium for transmitting hemorrhagic fever.

There is no vaccine for this disease in humans or animals, and its primary symptoms are fever, muscle pain and abdominal pain, but when it develops, it leads to bleeding from the eyes, ears and nose, leading to failure in the body’s organs, which results in death, according to the Iraqi Ministry of Health.

And infection with the hemorrhagic fever virus leads to death at a rate ranging between 10 to 40 percent of those infected.