An outbreak of conjunctivitis has affected more than 500 teachers and 13 thousand students in central Mozambique

A total of 544 teachers from several schools in the Sofala province in central Mozambique have contracted hemorrhagic conjunctivitis, an outbreak that has affected the entire country and one school had to be closed, local authorities said this Friday.

“We have a platform where we update data every day in all districts (…). We have 13,165 infected students and 544 teachers,” Sarita Chinai Fainde, coordinator of the nutrition and school health department of the provincial health department, said today. Sofala Education.

“In the case of the closed school, we have a group that is working on this issue,” the official in charge told reporters in Beira.

There are also reports of 45 education officers assigned to district services and 21 in the provincial education department who also contracted hemorrhagic conjunctivitis.

“As representatives of the education sector, we are aware of the problem of conjunctivitis, and the provincial leadership has participated in some meetings with representatives of the health sector to discuss how we can prevent this outbreak,” he stressed.

Also this Friday, the president of the Confederation of Economic Associations of Mozambique (CTA), Agostinho Vuma, warned in Maputo that the outbreak of conjunctivitis, which has affected several regions of the country, is affecting the productivity of companies.

“The emergence of an outbreak of conjunctivitis affects labor productivity. Companies are dismissing affected employees who spend more than 15 days at home, which affects the company’s productivity,” Vuma said, speaking in Maputo at the first plenary meeting of the Labor Advisory Council. The Commission, which also unites the Government.

The Ministry of Health recently reported that the number of Mozambicans infected with adenovirus, which causes hemorrhagic conjunctivitis, has increased to about 17 thousand, especially in the provinces of Nampula and Sofala.

“Companies are part of society and therefore have a responsibility not only because the most valuable resource is the employee, but also for the families who are the guarantor of the market for the products they produce. In this sense, as a sign of solidarity in the face of hemorrhagic conjunctivitis that affects our population, we want to urge the community to unite and pay attention to the guidelines issued by health authorities in order to mitigate the spread of this disease and protect the health of everyone. “, Vuma addressed.

As of March 11, officials said at least seven provinces in Mozambique had reported cases of conjunctivitis, most of them in Nampula in northern Mozambique. Meanwhile, the Beira Central Hospital in Sofala province alone, the largest health facility in the center of the country, reported a total of 2,800 cases of conjunctivitis as of March 19.