Recife, May 27, 2004 (Agência Brasil) - The state Department of Health has intensified surveillance activities in the municipality of São Bento do Una, in the sub-humid transition zone of the state of Pernambuco, where eight cases of cholera have been confirmed since April, as well as an epidemic of diarrhea, caused by two types of bacteria, affecting over a thousand residents of peripheral districts.

The steps which are being implemented in the city to prevent and control the disease through a community effort with the participation of Department of Health and Ministry of Health professionals, community and religious leaders, military personnel, teachers, and students, include talks and pamphlets to orient the population about care with personal hygience and food, especially fruit and vegetables.

According to the Department's superintendent of epidemiological and sanitary surveillance, Zuleide Wanderley, cholera bacteria were discovered in two of the city's cisterns, one public and one private. Both of them had to be isolated.

She said that another preventive measure that is proving successful is the increased volume of water supplied to the municipality, which faces rationing, by the Pernambucan Sanitation Company, Compesa, with a larger dose of chlorine.

Wanderley guaranteed that the cases of diarrhea, which got as high as 200 per week, have fallen to 40, meaning that the situation is under control.

Pernambuco had not registered a case of cholera for two years. Besides diarrhea, this contagious disease causes abdominal pain and dehydration through loss of fluids and minerals. It is transmitted by contaminated water and food.

Translator: David Silberstein