Vusumuzi Dube Sunday News Reporter
IT is 10pm, Ms Buhle Ncube paces up and down the hospital waiting room. She can barely hold back her tears as her only love, her first-born daughter, continues to vomit uncontrollably. Not only is this once lively toddler vomiting, but she also has severe diarrhoea. What pains Ms Ncube the most is that only three days ago, her daughter was out and about playing with her peers but now she can hardly lift her hand and her skin has turned pale, this as a result of dehydration caused by her continued vomiting.
Ms Ncube’s daughter had just been diagnosed with rotavirus.
In recent years, Zimbabwe has seen an increase in rotavirus cases, and it has claimed lives.
Many have attributed the increase in the cases to the unavailability of clean drinking water.
Rotavirus is the most common cause of diarrhoea among children under the age of five and is prevalent during the winter season.
According the Ministry of Health and Child Care, to date 211 people in the country have died of common diarrhoea-related deaths with six being children who reportedly succumbed to rotavirus. By this time last year 409 deaths had been recorded.
The data further states that a total of 210 185 cases of common diarrhoea have been recorded so far this year with Manicaland and Mashonaland West provinces recording the highest number of cases.
A total of 4 000 cases of the disease were recorded during the week ending 31 May this year, with Manicaland and Mashonaland West recording the highest number of cases, 1 650 and 1 141 respectively.
Midlands province recorded the highest number of deaths, with five people having given in to the disease at different health institutions around the province inside one week.
Masvingo province recorded three deaths and Harare province two, while Mashonaland East, and Mashonaland Central provinces each recorded one death to bring to 12 the number of deaths recorded during the period under review.
Ironically, Manicaland and Mashonaland West province which had the highest number of cases did not record any deaths during the week under review.
The Ministry of Health and Child Care has been on record attributing the high number of common diarrhoea cases recorded in the country to lack of proper sanitation in most communities around the country.
The 2012 national census report shows that 24 percent of the country’s population practised open air defecation due to lack of toilet facilities, while 25 percent of the country’s population relied on unprotected water sources.
In 2013, diarrhoea accounted for about 70 percent of deaths among infants nationwide.
In 2009, WHO estimated that rotavirus vaccination would help reduce child deaths by about 45 percent.
Health and Child Care Minister Dr David Parirenyatwa said his ministry was working at reducing the number of children infected by rotavirus hence their drive to ensure that they manage to vaccinate more children.
“The only way to win the fight against rotavirus is by ensuring that we vaccinate more children. It is the only way knowing that we have no known cure for this virus. We, however, have to ensure that we conscientise our citizens knowing that we have some people who still don’t believe in vaccination because of their religious beliefs,” said Dr Parirenyatwa.
Ministry of Health and Child Care director of epidemiology and disease control Dr Portia Manangazira reiterated the minister’s statement saying they were now on a nationwide drive of increasing the number of children vaccinated.
“In 2013 we rolled out a vaccine for every child aged between 10 and 14 weeks. At this age the children would have not yet been exposed to the virus in the dirty water or contaminated environment, and they would also have grown enough to develop the required immunity.
“This vaccine is therefore available on the national immunisation schedule, and clearly reflected on the child health cards together with the rest of childhood vaccinations that government provides free of charge with support from Unicef, and the World Health Organisation,” she said.
Dr Manangazira said it was their hope that more children get the vaccine to help decrease the number of babies who got the virus.
Rotavirus infection can be associated with severe dehydration in infants and children. Severe dehydration can lead to death in some cases, so it is important to recognise and treat this complication.
In addition to the symptoms of rotavirus infection cited above, parents should be aware of the symptoms of dehydration that can occur with rotavirus infection or with other serious conditions.
Some of the symptoms of dehydration include lethargy, dry, cool skin, absence of tears when crying, dry or sticky mouth, sunken eyes or sunken fontanelle (the soft spot on the head of infants) and extreme thirst.
Since rotavirus infection is highly contagious, those who are around infected people are at high risk of infection. For this reason, children in group day-care settings or pre-schools are at risk.
Babies and toddlers between the ages of six and 24 months are at greatest risk of developing severe disease from rotavirus infection. However, most children will become infected with rotavirus by the age of three. Adults may also become infected, but the resulting illness is usually less severe than that in infants and young children.
Children can transmit the virus when they forget to wash their hands before eating or after using the toilet. Touching a surface that has been contaminated with rotavirus and then touching the mouth area can result in infection.
There also have been cases of low levels of rotavirus in respiratory tract secretions and other body fluids. Because the virus is stable (remains infective) in the environment, transmission can occur through ingestion of contaminated water or food and contact with contaminated surfaces.
Rotavirus can survive for days on hard and dry surfaces, and it can live for hours on human hands.
There is no specific treatment for rotavirus. For people with healthy immune systems, rotavirus infection of the bowel (gastroenteritis) is a self-limited illness, lasting for only a few days.
The treatment consists of increased fluid intake (oral rehydration) to prevent dehydration. About one in 40 children with rotavirus infection of the bowel requires hospitalisation for intravenous fluid.