A plague outbreak has killed 40 people on the island nation of Madagascar, with 119 people diagnosed with the bacterial disease since August.
Two people have been diagnosed and one has died in the capital, Antananarivo. The World Health Organisation fears the plague outbreak may spread rapidly through Madagascar’s largest and densely populated city, worsened by the country’s poor health care system.
WHO said a national task force has been set up to manage the outbreak, with the cost of the project reaching USD 200,000. The international health organisation said it is working with the Red Cross and Madagascan health authorities to control the disease. The plague is a disease carried by rodents and spread by fleas. Humans are most often infected when they are bitten by fleas, causing swelling of the lymph nodes and sometimes pneumonia.
Combatting the disease has been made more difficult by a high level of resistance to an insecticide used to control fleas, according to the World Health Organisation.