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Scabies outbreak hits Malawi's commercial city of Blantyre

Xinhua English

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BLANTYRE, Malawi, Oct. 27 (Xinhua) -- Scabies, a highly contagious skin disease caused by parasites, has broken out in Malawi's commercial city of Blantyre, health authorities have confirmed.

A statement signed by the Director of Health and Social Services for Blantyre district, Gift Kawalazira, said a total of 255 cases have been recorded from June to September in both rural and urban areas of the district.

Kawalazira has, however, assured the general public that the district's health office has adequate supplies including medicines (scabicides) to treat everyone presenting with signs and symptoms of the outbreak.

The official has since advised institutions that deal with large groups of people like schools, churches, and mosques to be on high alert on monitoring of the signs and symptoms and report any suspected cases to health authorities without delay.

Scabies is associated with poor personal hygiene and the common presenting signs and symptoms include severe itching, especially at night, that causes scratch marks, lesions between fingers, on the hand, feet, flexor sides of wrists and armpits.

Meanwhile, the Blantyre health office is conducting active surveillance in addition to sensitizing communities on adherence to preventive measures in order to control the spread of the outbreak in the district.

A study in 2020 rated scabies as a "major public health problem in parts of Malawi" and that "further work is required to more accurately assess the burden of disease and develop appropriate public health strategies for its control". Enditem

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