Typhoid outbreak now declining, mayor says

A day after the Department of Health declared a typhoid fever outbreak in Tuburan town in midwest Cebu, Mayor Aljun Diamante believes they are off the hill.

Diamante told Cebu Daily News that his town may have seen the worst based on the number of patients seeking consultations and those that need hospital confinement.

Of the 190 consultations around noon yesterday, only 14 were admitted to the district hospital.

At least 92 patients were admitted in the 25-bed Tuburan District Hospital Monday evening,  the mayor said.

A total of 1,000 people have sought medical consultation and 23 were ill enough to be referred to the Vicente Sotto Memorial Medical Center in Cebu City.

Integrated Provincial Health Officer Dr. Cristina Giango said in a text message to Cebu Daily News that 80 out of 92 patients were already discharged from the hospital yesterday.

The second-class municipality’s water system (level 3), which directly services households, is sourced from open springs without chlorine treatment until very recently.

Mayor Diamante admitted yesterday that when he assumed as mayor in 2010, there were no chlorine treatment plants.

“We just installed them now when the typhoid fever cases erupted,” he told CDN.

The mayor declared a state of calamity last March 2 because of the wave of cases of fever, severe diarrhea and headaches, which are symptoms of typhoid.

Water samples taken from the town were positive of fecal coliform.

The contaminated water is blamed for the typhoid outbreak that resulted in the infliction of more than 800 residents of typhoid fever since Feb. 20 this year.

Patients come from 20 of Tuburan’s 54 barangays. Meanwhile, two water chlorinators have been installed in the water source in sitio Magdagook, barangay Kalangahan.

This water source, according to Mayor Diamante, provides water to at least eight barangays in the town proper in poblacion.

“Ang affected lang gyud kaayo nga water source is kaning nag supply sa lungsod, which covers eight barangays in Poblacion,” he said.

“This is the first time that it happened to Tuburan and I wasn’t expecting this to happened. Kana atoang water supply, project na sa atong gipulihan, and ever since wala man gyud na mahitabo,” he said.

Tuburan town is being supplied by the Tuburan Water District managed by the municipality.

Mayor Diamante said this was established even before he was elected mayor.

As far as he knows, the water system project was funded with P28 million by former congressman of the third district, Dr. Antonio Yapha.

Diamante said the water system is level 3 wherein water is directly produced through the pipes in the households of the municipality.

Towns folk pay a minimum of P50 for their monthly water bill. Payments and collections of water is made at the municipal treasurer’s office.

After its declaration of state of calamity, the town has used up P400,000 from its P1.5 million calamity fund.

This amount was used in the purchases of medicines, hospital payments and food of the patients.