Health Journal Entry
Meningitis Toll Rises in Africa (April 6, 2009)
Map shows the meningitis belt across Africa, where the deadly disease spreads this time of the year. WHO.
The outbreak of dangerous meningitis keeps spreading across a wide stretch of Africa known as the meningitis belt. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), northern Nigeria has been hit especially hard. More than 17,000 cases have been reported in the country, with nearly 1,000 deaths. Niger, found across Nigeria's northern border, has over 4,500 cases and 170 deaths.
Meningitis is an infection of the tissue and fluid of the spinal cord and brain. Its symptoms include fever, headaches, and vomiting. There are different causes of the disease, but the bacterial variety is the most dangerous. It can cause brain damage, deafness, or death. The contagious disease can spread to others from the sneezes or coughs of an infected person.
The disease regularly spreads in Africa in the meningitis belt stretching across sub-Sahara Africa, from Senegal in the west to Ethiopia in the east. It's especially a problem in the dry season when warm winds blow steadily and spread microbes. The worst outbreak in memory was in 1996 and 1997, when over a quarter of a million people got sick and 25,000 died.
The World Health Organization is helping nations in the meningitis belt start up a new vaccination program. The program is already underway in both Nigeria and Niger. The goal is to vaccinate 250 million people across the continent by the year 2015.
