BEIRUT: Lebanon has recorded its first case of cholera since 1993, the state-run National News Agency reported on Thursday.
It said that the case was recorded on October 5 in the rural northern region of Akkar and that the patient was receiving treatment and in stable condition.
Lebanon Health Minister Firas Abiad said ‘highly likely’ cholera case in Lebanon is result of outbreak in neighbouring Syria crossing the border.
Syria has recorded 39 deaths from cholera and nearly 600 cases in an outbreak spreading in the war-ravaged country that the United Nations warned is “evolving alarmingly”.
A total of 594 cases have been recorded across 11 of its 14 provinces since late last month, the health ministry said on Tuesday.
“The situation is evolving alarmingly in affected governorates and expanding to new areas,” the World Health Organisation warned Tuesday.
Most of those who have died are in the northern province of Aleppo, and it was not immediately clear if the dead were included in the overall case tally.
It is the first major outbreak of cholera in Syria in over a decade.
The extremely virulent disease is generally contracted from contaminated food or water, and causes diarrhoea and vomiting.
It can spread in residential areas that lack proper sewerage networks or mains drinking water.
The disease is making its first major comeback since 2009 in Syria, where nearly two-thirds of water treatment plants, half of pumping stations and one-third of water towers have been damaged by more than a decade of war, according to the United Nations.
The source of the latest outbreak is believed to be the Euphrates River which has been contaminated by sewage pollution.
