(ERGO) – Abukar Osman Ahmed, a father of four, carried his small son on his back from their village of Bula-Aded to Shalanbood hospital, three kilometres away, when the child fell dangerously sick with diarrhoea during the night of 20 March.
Arriving just after dawn, Abukar found this small hospital in Lower Shabelle region packed with patients, including many other children, all suffering similar symptoms. He had to wait with his dehydrated son outside under a tree until the overstretched medical team were able to attend to him, as more patients kept arriving.
“My son had diarrhoea and vomiting and I was getting worried he needed emergency assistance. I gave him some pills, but when I saw they weren’t helping I rushed him here to the hospital. It started at night and we brought him in the morning at 6:00. We thank God, the doctors have helped him and he is now getting better,” Abukar told Radio Ergo’s local reporter.
The director of Shalambood hospital, Dr Mohamud Mohamud Jimale, said 182 patients had been admitted to the hospital since the beginning of March. He said samples had been shared with the ministry of health, which had confirmed cases of cholera.
Dr Mohamud went on to say that 154 of those hospitalised had been treated successfully and returned home. Three children under the age of five had died, however, and 25 patients remained in the hospital on the day that Abukar’s son was being admitted.
Medical staff and local residents believe that contaminated drinking water is the cause of the cholera outbreak in Shalanbood.
Four wells which supplied water to local people were buried by sand on 2 March. The only clean water available is being transported in by donkey cart from El-jalle, five kilometres away, and sold at 12,000 Somali shillings per jerry can. As that is unaffordable for most people, they resorted to unclean surface water sources.
Abukar said: “We used to drink water from the well, but now we consume water from reservoirs and other sources that we never used before, that’s the reason for this problem. The well broke down and so we use water from the reservoir, we are poor people so we have to drink from the reservoir.”
Abukar’s wife sells firewood earning a couple of dollars a day, only enough for one meal a day. Hardship has increased with their son’s emergency hospitalisation, as his wife hasn’t been able to work due to childcare priorities. They have been borrowing or depending on other people to get by.
According to Dr Mohamud, the hospital is not able to cope with this cholera outbreak with such a small staff and an inadequate supply of drugs. The hospital’s operations are supported by funding from the diaspora.
“If our situation continues like this, the hospital will not have the capacity to continue providing services because people are flocking in from different villages, including Golweyn, Siinay and Mushani. The patients arrive here in critical condition and they need intravenous injections and other medicines,” he said.
The hospital is also affected by the critical water shortage in the area and has been receiving water trucking services every day from other areas.
He urged that the wells be repaired and maintained to help curb the spread of the disease.
Another father, Ahmed Jelle Barow, who lives in Shalanbood, brought four members of his family for treatment at the hospital on 17 March. Speaking to Radio Ergo’s reporter whilst they were being discharged four days later, he said all his family members were now recovering after a few days of uncertainty. He was grateful that the treatment was free of charge.
“I brought four people – these are my wife and two children and my niece. I noticed they had diarrhoea and I bought medicines costing $1.5 from a pharmacy but they didn’t help them. Thank God, I brought them here and we got free treatment,” Ahmed said, adding that he had never experienced having multiple family members falling sick with diarrhoea simultaneously.
