Outbreak of diarrhoea spreading in Kampong Cham

Mom Kunthear

Phnom Penh Post

AN outbreak of diarrhoea has spread to two more villages in Kampong Cham, officials said Thursday, after two deaths in the province were attributed to the illness earlier this week.

Officials have now recorded 202 diarrhoea cases in Kampong Cham’s Stung Trang district in three days. During the first two days of the outbreak on Tuesday and Wednesday, officials said more than 100 people were being treated in health centres, and that two had died.

“The disease has spread to six villages on Thursday, and we are now taking measures to not allow it to spread to other villages,” said Yin Vibol, deputy director of the Chamkar Leu district referral hospital.

Officials in other areas were also reporting diarrhoea cases Thursday. Since the beginning of the year, officials in four provinces – Ratanakkiri, Kratie, Stung Treng and Kampong Cham – have reported that almost 30 people have died from diarrhoea-related illnesses.

Tha Bunthak, deputy director of the Ratanakkiri provincial health department, said his province has recorded 523 individual cases, including 15 deaths, so far this year.

That includes the death of a 70-year-old woman on Tuesday, part of an outbreak that saw at least 70 people hospitalised, he said.
In Kratie, officials have recorded 300 individual diarrhoea cases resulting in 10 deaths since March, said Keang Hong, deputy director of Kratie’s
provincial referral hospital.