The Medical Director at Wau Teaching Hospital in Western Bahr el Ghazal State said they have registered 30 patients presenting sign of jaundice – raising fears of a possible disease outbreak in the area.
Jaundice is when the skin or the whites of someone’s eyes turn yellow – an indication of infection such as liver disease, malaria or yellow fever.
Dr. Nixon Anthony said the cases were recorded in the last three weeks.
According to him, some of the patients tested negative for malaria, but there was no hepatitis case.
Nixon said the cases were reported in hospitals and clinics across the state, and that 16 samples have been sent to Juba for yellow fever examination.
“We can not say it is yellow fever, because the cases we received are jaundice cases an estimation of 20 to 30 cases they are samples that we have send to Juba because we do not have a lab here,” Dr. Anthony said.
“So, we can not say anything but there are jaundice cases in some areas of the state, we cannot conclude that it is yellow fever unless when the results are out from the National lab.”
The health official said the statistics could be more as they only registered cases reported to hospitals.
He said although the specific cause is unknown, jaundice can be caused by Malaria, Yellow Fever and Hepatitis B and C.
“We have checked them malaria some of them has and other do not, we also checked hepatitis A, B and C and the result is negative but the patient eyes and urine are yellowish. So, it is the lab results to tell us more, not anyone with yellowish eyes has yellow fever”.
