Neglect of hand hygiene blamed for sharp rise in diarrhoea cases
Mombasa County is witnessing high cases of diarrhoea, a situation officials have attributed to poor hygiene.
The chief officer in charge of public health Pauline Oginga says the county is also grappling with dengue fever and a surge in Covid-19 infections.
Oginga said more than 8,600 cases of diarrhoea have been recorded in Mombasa since January to date, a situation she said could be a result of poor hand hygiene.
“In 2020 and 2021, diarrhoea cases had gone down because people were observing hand hygiene by either washing hands with soap and water or sanitizing. And this is why we say Covid-19 came with a blessing in disguise. However, now people have stopped washing their hands and we are seeing that cases of diarrhoea are back in very high numbers,” Oginga said.
Oginga appealed to residents to revert to proper hand hygiene and ensure that they only eat warm food and take clean water.
A report from the Public Health Department on monthly diarrhoea trends indicates the highest cases of diarrhoea in all the six sub-counties of Nyali, Mvita, Changamwe, Kisauni, and Likoni and Jomvu were recorded last month with Mvita leading with 2, 794 cases. Nyali followed with 2,317, Kisauni with 2,150.
