Cholera outbreak hits Motherland in Eastleigh
The Ministry of Health has confirmed a Cholera outbreak in Motherland, an informal settlement, in Eastleigh’s Section Three area.
Health CS Mutahi Kagwe confirmed the outbreak on Thursday when flagging off vehicles to support vaccine service delivery for 20 counties.
“We have a bit of Cholera in Kamukunji and I have absolutely no doubt that at the height of Covid-19 days there would have been no cholera because everybody would have been washing hands and sanitizing,” Kagwe said.
A section of Motherland, Eastleigh.
The Director of Public Health in the ministry Dr Fransic Kuria said his team had already collected samples from the area and its being analysed.
Two people have died while nine more including children have been admitted to various hospitals within Nairobi following the outbreak of cholera-like symptoms in Kamukunji, Nairobi.
According to community health workers at the area, one man died at Mama Lucy Kibaki Hospital while the second succumbed while waiting for an ambulance.
Raw sewerage in the informal settlement.
“I was called to the house of Njoroge and when I got there he was vomiting and had diarrhea. I called the an ambulance from MFS (Médecins Sans Frontières, or Doctors Without Borders) and was rushed to the hospital,” Said Lucy Ndungu one of the community
The second victim, identified as Herzon Musa died while waiting for the ambulance.
“We sat outside waiting for the ambulance and he just laid down, when the doctors from MSF got here, they examined him and said he was already dead,” Fatuma Mamillie.
Kamukunji MP Yusuf Hassan Abdi (with black cap) in Motherland, Eastleigh where two people have died of cholera.
The pungent odour, smelled from kilometers away, is what welcomed the team from nation
The odor was unbearable, as were the flies and stink bugs, there was also open sewage flowing downstream to a dumping site a stone throw away from the homesteads.
The drinking water pipes in the area were submerged in the open raw sewage.
Children were playing next to the sewage unaware of the danger it’s posing to their health.
Raw sewage flowing in Motherland, Eastleigh Section Three on May 5, 2022.
A few steps away from the tarmacked road, women cook food with zero disregard to their safety.
Young women were just seated next to the sewage making their hair while a group of young men were searching through the garbage for used plastics, electronics, and metals to resell.
According to the residents of the area, the open and the garbage menace has been there for the last three months but the situation has been made worse by the rains experienced in the city in the past weeks.
“Because of the rain causing floods due to poor drainage, the sewage is flowing directly in some houses living the families,” Ms Ndungu added.
Speaking during a visit to assess the situation the area MP Yusuf Hassan described the condition as inhuman. He promised to engage the Nairobi Metropolitan Services to have the dumpsite cleared.
“It’s inhuman to have raw sewage pouring in the neighbourhood, there water is also mixing with sewage water due to leakage. I will meet up with the Director General to have this sorted immediately because it is a ticking bomb,” Yusuf said.
