Hopeful: Towards the tail end of the Zambia cholera 2017/2018 outbreak?

Abstract

Early October 2017, cholera broke out in two sub-districts of Lusaka District. In the 4th week of the outbreak, the response team was excited to see a drastic drop in the number of cases. But the following week, the numbers of cases increased again. The epi curve showed exponential growth until week 14 of the outbreak (epi week 1 in 2018), when weekly incidence peaked at 709 cases/100,000 population. Incidence then fell rapidly for 4 weeks. Since January, incidence has fallen, to a weekly rate of 0.9/100,000 population in epi week 20 (Ministry of Health, unpublished situation report). In the current issue of The Health Press, we reprint an article from the 18 May 2018 issue of the MMWR, ‘Cholera Epidemic — Lusaka, Zambia, October 2017– May 2018’ that will give readers insight into the outbreak situation between 6 October 2017 and 5 May 2018 and the public health response then ongoing that ultimately ended the outbreak.