Myanmar: Measles outbreak in remote north under control

By Kyaw Ye Lynn

YANGON, Myanmar

An outbreak of measles-like diseases that killed dozens of people in a remote and impoverished region of northern Myanmar has been brought under control after seven weeks, according to authorities Friday.

At least 41 people -- mostly children -- succumbed to the illness, characterized by measles-like symptoms, in nine villages in the Naga Self-Administered Zone in Sagaing region, a mountainous area populated by people from the Naga tribes on the border with India.

State-run The Mirror newspaper said Friday that no more deaths from the viral diseases were reported in the region as the situation was finally under control.

“The disease is now under control as specialists from the capital have come and given treatment,” the zone’s chairman Kay Sai was quoted as saying.

“They’ve identified the previously mysterious disease as measles and it has since stopped spreading,” he said.

According to the report, doctors and health workers sent by the central and regional governments are administering vaccinations and providing medical treatment for locals in villages in two townships of the zone where the disease broke out.

Reports have suggested that the illness that has caused the deaths leads to rashes, a difficulty breathing, and the patient coughing up specks of blood. It is one of the many infections that have struck the area since early June, with hundreds affected by viral diseases including diarrhea, influenza, cough and eye problems.

On Sunday, state media reported that many of those suffering had "measles", with the virus found in the blood of three out of five children tested.

Last week, the ministry of health said that a major factor in the spread of the disease was the problem officials had reaching the area to administer vaccines.

Around 120,000 people live in Sagaing region, where many Naga communities -- a conglomeration of several tribes inhabiting the northeastern part of India and northwestern Myanmar -- are impoverished and inaccessible by road.