More than 5 years ago on January 12, 2010, a powerful 7.0 magnitude earthquake hit the Caribbean island of Haiti less than 20 miles from the capital of Port-au-Prince, which resulted in a death toll in the hundreds of thousands.
In October of that year, thousands of people contracted the serious bacterial infection, cholera. Since that time through March of 2015, Haiti has seen 734,983 cholera cases, of which 419,087 were hospitalized (57% cumulative hospitalization rate), and 8,761 deaths. The cumulative case fatality rate remains at 1.2%.
Most disheartening is the latest numbers from the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) who report 10,328 cholera cases, including 8,124 hospitalizations (79% hospitalization rate), and 106 deaths in the first 11 weeks of 2015.
To put this in perspective, in 2014 during the same period, Haiti reported 3,850 cholera cases had been recorded, including 18 deaths.
LISTEN: Outbreak News Radio: Haiti Cholera Outbreak And Link To UN Peacekeepers
In fact, the UN agency says the number of cases reported during the first months of 2015, are equivalent to those reported in 2012.
Health officials say intense and widespread circulation of Vibrio cholerae O:1 is seen at the community level. The transmission of cholera in Haiti now presents an endemic pattern.
Elsewhere in the neighboring Dominican Republic, there were 185 suspected cholera cases registered, including 9 deaths.
This represents an increase of more than double the cases recorded for the same period of 2014. This situation in the Dominican Republic is linked to the cholera dynamics registered in Haiti during the same period.
