The Yobe State Government says it recoded 2,510 cases of Cerebrospinal Meningitis, Type C, from 25th December, 2023 to April, 2024.
It added that 85 patients died from the disease on or before reaching healthcare facilities.
The Commissioner for Health and Human Services, Dr Muhammad Lawan Gana, revealed this while briefing newsmen on the outbreak of the disease in the state.
“From that December to last week, there are a total of number of 2,510 cases out which 85 cases died and all the 85 that died, investigation showed that they were either reporting very late to healthcare facility or they didn’t report at all,” he said.
He added in the last 24 hours, the state recorded 28 new cases of the disease and one death.
“In the last two weeks, we recorded only two deaths from the meningitis,” he said.
According to him some of the actions taken against the outbreak of the disease in the state include establishment of a temporary Emergency Operations Centre in Potiskum town being the epicenter of the disease, designation of Potiskum Specialist Hospital as tertiary site for the management of meningitis and vaccination of more than 400,000 people against Type C of the disease in the area.
Other measures include engaging adhoc personnel including a professor of infectious diseases to take care of the cases, embarking on aggressive community sensitization as well as carrying out of daily review meetings with partners on the situation at hand.
“The outcome of all these interventions is the fact that we are actually recording reduced number of deaths,” he said.
Gana, however, debunked a report making the rounds on social media, which stated that the state had in last two weeks recorded more than 200 deaths arising from a strange disease.
He described the report as fake, misleading and unfounded.