Abstract
BACKGROUND: Cholera is an acute diarrhea disease caused by infection of the intestine with the toxigenic bacterium Vibrio cholerae serogroup O1 or O139. It is a waterborne disease of global health importance with an estimated 3 to 5 million cases and over 100,000 deaths annually. METHODS: Our key objective was to analyze the epidemiology of a cholera outbreak in the Somali region of Ethiopia, which took place in 2017, using an electronic surveillance cholera database. We investigated 7 cholera-affected-districts. In total, 4115 cases of cholera were reported, of which 3846 (93.5%) records were eligible. RESULTS: Three thousand eight hundred forty six cases and 112 deaths from 11 Cholera Treatment Centres (CTC) were reported, with attack risk (AR) of 103 per 10,000 populations, and a case fatality rate (CFR) of 2.95 %. The CFR was 3.1 in females and 2.8 in males. People with travel history to a cholera affected area were five times more likely to die from cholera (OR 5.00; 95% CI 3.23-7.87). People with severe dehydration were seven times more likely to die (OR 7.80; 95%CI 2.44-47.60). The age-specific CFR was highest (4.9%) in the 2-4 years’ age group, and lowest (1.7%) in the 15-44 age range. CONCLUSIONS: Pastoral communities ought to be provided access to clean and safe drinkable water. There must be availability of anti-cholera vaccines to tackle the burden of the disease, for example, the OCV recommended by the Global Task Force on Cholera Control.