Yemen Monitor/ Paris/ Exclusive:
Scientists from the National Reference Center for Cholera Bacteria at the Pasteur Institute, in collaboration with the Mayotte University Hospital in France, have revealed the spread of a highly drug-resistant strain of cholera that originated in Yemen and has spread to Lebanon and Kenya.
The study was published on December 11, 2024, in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Cholera is an infectious diarrheal disease caused by a particular type of bacteria called Vibrio cholerae. In its most severe form, cholera is one of the deadliest infectious diseases: without treatment, patients can die within hours.
Treatment primarily involves replacing lost fluids and electrolytes, but antibiotics are also used in addition to treating dehydration. They are essential to reduce the duration of infection and break the chains of transmission as quickly as possible.
A strain resistant to ten antibiotics – including azithromycin and ciprofloxacin, two of the three recommended for treating cholera – was first identified in Yemen during the 2018-2019 cholera outbreak.
Scientists have now been able to track the spread of this strain by studying bacterial genomes. After Yemen, it was identified again in Lebanon in 2022, then in Kenya in 2023, and finally in Tanzania and the Comoros – including Mayotte, a French department off the southeastern coast of Africa – in 2024. Between March and July 2024, the island of Mayotte was affected by an outbreak of 221 cases caused by this highly drug-resistant strain.
Approximately 175,000 cases of acute watery diarrhea and cholera were reported between the beginning of the year and August 2024, with more than 172,023 cases of acute watery diarrhea and suspected cholera cases in Yemen, with 668 associated deaths, according to a UNICEF statement. On average, more than 1,500 cases have been reported daily in recent weeks. While the number of cases is much lower than the previous outbreak between 2016 and 2021 when more than 2.5 million suspected cases and 4,000 deaths were reported, there are fears that the situation will deteriorate during the current rainy season in the country.
