A total of 76 persons reportedly died from yellow fever in three Nigerian states within 11 days, Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) has announced.
The affected states are Bauchi, Delta and Enugu states and the deaths occurred between November 1 and 11.
While 74 suspected cases involving 35 deaths were reported from Delta State, 70 suspected cases with 33 deaths from Enugu and 78 suspected cases with eight deaths was also reported in Bauchi State.
Three samples from Delta, one sample from Enugu and eight samples from Bauchi were confirmed as yellow fever from the Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) test conducted at the NCDC National Reference Laboratory, Gaduwa in the Federal Capital Territory.
The NCDC’s Director-General, Chikwe Ihekweazu said the National Yellow Fever Emergency Operations Centre (EOC) was activated to coordinate all response activities across the affected states on November 7.
He added that most of the cases were males with ages ranging from 1-55 years and they presented symptoms that included fever, headache, fatigue, jaundice, abdominal pain, vomiting with or without blood, epistaxis, blood in stools/urine.