Cholera Strikes Down 32 in Dominican Republic

Cholera has laid low 32 persons in the Dominican Republic but with no fatalities, announced news reports. Health officials have introduced new measures to slow the advance of the cholera epidemic from neighboring Haiti, which is suffering a much more severe outbreak of the potentially lethal disease.

President Leonel Fernandez this week was to receive a visit from Haitian President Rene Preval for talks on coordinating anti-cholera efforts across the whole of Hispaniola, the Caribbean island shared by the two countries.

Dominican officials further tightened border crossing with Haiti, where the disease has killed 2,120 and infected more than 97,000 since the outbreak surfaced in the central Artibonite River valley in mid-October.

Haiti and the Dominican Republic share a porous border of some 376 kilometers (234 miles).

The Santo Domingo government also forbids use of water from the Artibonite River, which traverses most of the island and runs along much of the Dominican-Haitian border.

Source-AFP