Zimbabwe cholera death toll nears 500

ZIMBABWE yesterday slipped deeper into crisis as the death toll from a cholera epidemic neared 500 and members of President Robert Mugabe’s armed forces were accused of taking part in a looting spree.

While the army played down violence by a “small number of indisciplined soldiers” directed against dealers in desperately-short foreign currency, the leader of the opposition said the country was completely collapsing.

With the capital Harare without water for a second day running, staff at the city’s main hospital stayed away from work. Employees also failed to show at hospitals in two other key cities, Bulawayo and Mutare.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) said the cholera outbreak could rise rapidly unless people have quick access to treatment. In its latest toll, the Geneva-based WHO said that 483 people were now known to have died from the water-borne disease.

The most affected region was Budirio, a province of the capital, where some 5,829 suspected cases have been recorded, said a UN spokeswoman. The state mouthpiece Herald newspaper meanwhile reported that 390 people had died and water had been cut off in about all the capital’s suburbs, industrial areas and central business district. The shut down led residents to criss-cross the city in search of water, even resorting to lifting manholes to access pipes.

Informal traders were cashing in on the crisis, selling a 25-litre plastic container of water for $25 dollars (€19) with water authorities citing a lack of chemicals as the reason for the shut down, the newspaper said. Anger towards black marketeers, long accused of profiting from the country’s misery, has been steadily growing with the cholera crisis.

The looting yesterday in Harare broke out during an operation by soldiers to arrest illegal forex (currency) dealers, degenerating into a looting binge in several shops, which was finally halted with the intervention of the police.

“Whatever is happening is not the official position of the army,” said army spokesman Colonel Simon Tsatsi. “We don’t subscribe to that. It is probably just a few small number of indisciplined soldiers who are doing this.”

Black market foreign currency peddling has become rampant in Zimbabwe as the country battles food and chronic currency shortages with inflation at a staggering 231 million percent.