At least 20 boarding school pupils have died and hundreds more have been affected due to a meningitis outbreak in Nigeria, the education commissioner for northeastern Yobe state reported on Wednesday.
Mohammed Sani Idriss stated, “We have detected a meningitis outbreak in six secondary schools in the state, which resulted in the death of 20 students out of the 473 infected.”
The Government Technical College in Potiskum, which has been worst hit and is responsible for 17 of the deaths, is the epicentre of the outbreak, according to Idriss.
According to him, the schools are equipped with emergency treatment facilities, isolation centres, and medical surveillance with isolation centers and emergency care facilities, he said.
“The situation is under control because we have not recorded any new cases in the past two days while 370 of those hospitalized have recovered and been discharged,” Idriss added.
Meningitis is an infection of the lining around the brain and spinal cord, transmitted through respiratory droplets or throat secretions.
It has a high fatality rate and children are especially at risk.
Nigeria lies in the so-called “meningitis belt” of sub-Saharan Africa, stretching from Senegal in the west to Ethiopia in the east, where outbreaks of the disease are common.
