The Department of Health has urged the public to remain calm after the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) discovered two cases of diphtheria.
According to the department, the NICD discovered the cases in a child in the Western Cape and in an adult in KwaZulu-Natal last month.
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According to News24, the department explained that diphtheria is a rare but preventable infection spread through respiratory droplets from coughing or sneezing.
It urged parents to get their children vaccinated against the disease.
The statement read:
‘The vaccine should be given to all children as a routine vaccine in the first year of life. Booster doses should also be given at 6 and 12 years of age. Catch-up vaccination is possible if doses have been missed. Clinicians, including primary healthcare nurses throughout the economy, have been urged to have a high index of suspicion of diphtheria, to notify suspected cases, and to send specimens to the laboratory for testing.’
The department added that people in close contact with infected people are at risk of becoming ill and explained that the toxin-producing bacterium can cause breathing difficulties, heart rhythm problems, and, in severe cases, death.
Symptoms of diphtheria include a sore throat with the formation of a membrane on the tonsils and throat, as well as swollen glands in the front of the neck.
The department also instructed laboratories to test all throat swabs for diphtheria and report positive cases to the NICD’s Centre for Respiratory Diseases and Meningitis.
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