Maputo — In the past week the number of confirmed cases of cholera diagnosed in the central Mozambican port city of Beira have risen from two to 56.

An official of the Sofala Provincial Health Directorate, Virginia Saldanha, confirmed on Monday that an average of five people a day are being hospitalised in the city with cholera.

A special cholera ward operating in a former warehouse in the industrial part of Beira reopened to accommodate these patients.

Saldanha said that most of the cholera patients are children. The poor treatment of drinking water in Beira, and the heaps of stinking garbage in the city suburbs are regarded as the main causes of the outbreak.

The summer heat has increased the demand for water: but although Beira is one of the cities where the management of the water supply has been privatised, the quality of the water made available to the public remains poor. The rains that have been falling in the city also held spread water-borne diseases such as cholera.

Saldanha said that all health units in Beira have been equipped with sufficient chlorine to treat water sources in the communities in their areas.

At the weekend an emergency meeting was held between the provincial health authorities, and the various NGOs working in this area, at which tasks, and geographical areas, were attributed to each organisation.

The province was divided between the four main NGOs working in the health area. The Mozambican Red Cross will be the main partner for the health directorate in Beira itself. KULIMA will work in Caia district, the Foundation against Hunger has taken on the districts of Marromeu, Gorongosa and Nhamatanda, while the catholic church charity, Caritas, is taking on the south of the province (Buzi, Chibabava and Macanga districts).

Recent reports indicate that at least ten people have died of acute diarrhoeas in Maringue district in the last two weeks.

It is not yet clear whether this was cholera - but acute diarrhoea and vomiting are the classic symptoms of the disease.