Sierra Leone: Mabela, Susan’s Bay Ready to Eradicate Cholera

Residents of Mabela and Susan’s Bay in the eastern part of Freetown have pledged their support to fight against cholera in the community and the country as a whole by cleaning their environment and sensitizing the people of the community on the need for hygiene.

As a result, collaboration effort was agreed between a group of youths called Health Management Committee and the youths in Susan’s Bay and Mabela communities to involve in community cleaning and sensitization of their respective communities in order to get rid of cholera around them.

In an exclusive interview with the chairman of the committee, Foday Sesay, he told Concord Times that the committee came up with the cleaning exercise in order to get rid of the cholera disease and its rampage on their communities with several lives recorded to have been lost.

Sesay said the outbreak of cholera in the country has been a threat to the lives of the people and they are ready to fight against it in the little way they can. “We believe that by cleaning our communities, we are taking a great step to purge cholera out of our community,” he said.

George Focko, a nurse attached to the Mabela Cholera Unit Clinic, said about 200 under-five children have been admitted at the clinic for cholera “but we thank God none has been reported dead presently and we will do our best to see that we keep them alive”.

For adults, Focko said that about 662 cases of cholera infections have been reported at the clinic and about 28 of them have been reported dead because the clinic is running out of medical supplies.

A resident of Susan’s Bay, Fatmata Kargbo, said there have been lots of cholera affected persons in the community and it is getting more serious as many people have died so far.