The Environmental Health Council of Nigeria (EHCON) has called on all health facilities to create isolation centres  or camps for effective management of cholera patients.

Dr Yakubu Baba, EHCON registrar, made the call in an interview with journalists on Saturday in Abuja.

He said the centres would be managed by the medicals and Environmental Health Officers (EHO).

Mr Baba said that environmental health could be achieved by putting the necessary preventive measures in place.

He said that the measures included graduated buckets that collected patient vomitus and the diarrhea; adding that the bucket was purposely for measuring the level of dehydration of patient.

“The level of dehydration is reported to the medical doctor to make sure that the necessary fluid is been replaced as the patient is passing the vomitus and stool.

Mr Baba said that the EHO was responsible for the management of contaminated faecal matter and the vomitus of the patient by ensuring continuous disinfection of stool and vomitus.

“I encourage all EHO working in such facilities to embark on current and concurrent disinfection.

“The patient and caregivers must also take the necessary universal precautions because of the infectious nature of the disease.

“I call on healthcare givers to ensure they put on necessary protective equipment and also embark on five level of disinfection which is normally adopted as standard operation procedure as far as cholera outbreak is concern.

“They should embark on five stages of disinfection measure before they leave the facility,” he said.

Mr Baba frowned at the rate of visitation of diarrhoea patients by loved ones, which undermined the infectious nature of the disease.

He tasked the environmental health authority to establish a disinfection point, adding that any visitor coming in and going out of the centre must be disinfected, being the standard protocol of environmental health isolation centres.

The registrar identified cholera as an infectious disease that caused severe watery diarrhoea and vomiting and could lead to dehydration and death if untreated.

According to him, cholera is caused by eating food or drinking water contaminated with a bacterium called vibrio cholerae.

(NAN)