By Mohammed Suleiman, Dutse
The World Health Organisation has said that Nigeria recorded 532 suspected cases of meningitis with 124 deaths out of the 1,686 cases reported within the last seven months and with a case-fatality ratio of seven per cent.
Zinder Region of the neighbouring Niger Republic accounts for the remaining cases.
The cases in Nigeria, were reported from 81 local government areas in 22 states and the Federal Capital Territory from October 1, 2022, to April 16, 2023.
The report showed that males account for 57 per cent of the total suspected cases.
“The highest proportion of reported cases is among children aged 1 to 15 years. Jigawa state accounts for 74 per cent (n = 1252) of all suspected cases, and this State borders the Zinder region in Niger, where a meningitis outbreak has been reported since October 2022.
“A total of 481 cerebrospinal fluid samples were collected from patients in 18 states. Out of these samples, 247 tested positive for bacterial infection by PCR test. Among the positive cases, 226 (91 per cent) were caused by Neisseria meningitidis serogroup C (NmC), while 13 cases (5.4 per cent) were caused by Streptococcus pneumoniae, and only one case (0.4 per cent) by Haemophilus influenzae.
“For 232 samples the result was negative, and for two the result is pending. In the last five weeks alone (epidemiological weeks 11-15), 41 out of 140 samples tested (29 per cent) were positive for NmC. The confirmed cases were reported from eight states including Jigawa (231), Zamfara (six), Yobe (five), Benue (one), Gombe (one), Katsina (one), Oyo (one), and Sokoto (one).
Jigawa state consists of 27 LGAs, of which 25 have reported at least one suspected case. There have been 66 deaths in Jigawa state. During the current outbreak, Maigatari LGA and Sule-tankarkar LGA have both crossed the epidemic threshold of 10 suspected cases per 100,000 population and account for 60 per cent of the total reported cases, with 505 and 247 cases respectively,” the report reads in part.
The CFR for the outbreak is seven per cent and five per cent at the national and Jigawa state level, respectively.