Outbreak update – Cholera in Somalia, 10 January 2021
Disease
How the score is calculated
The score starts at 8. It adds points from recorded affected, deaths, displaced and casualty counts, plus terms found in the story title, event type or status. For each count, only its highest matching band is used.
- Affected people
- 1–999: +5 · 1,000–9,999: +12 · 10,000–99,999: +20 · 100,000–999,999: +28 · 1 million+: +35
- Deaths
- 1–9: +8 · 10–99: +14 · 100–999: +22 · 1,000+: +30
- Displaced people
- 1–9,999: +6 · 10,000–99,999: +12 · 100,000+: +18
- Casualties
- 100 or more: +8
- Story wording
- +10 for terms such as catastrophe, famine, war, conflict, major earthquake, mass casualty or critical. Otherwise, +5 for active, ongoing, emergency, outbreak, cyclone or hurricane.
Score bands: Watch 0–24 · Moderate 25–49 · High 50–74 · Critical 75–100. Scores are capped at 100. Missing or unparseable figures add no points.
This is a rule-based WorldsAid triage indicator, not an official or independently validated classification. It does not account for recency or local context, and it can understate events with incomplete reporting. Check the linked sources.
Historical record
Status: CLOSED · Imported 2026-10-07
Closed for this historical import at the site owner’s request; not a new assessment of current conditions.
In brief
- What happened17 January 2021 – The Ministry of Health of Somalia has announced 68 new suspected cases of cholera, with no reported death, for epidemiological week 2 (4 -10 January 2021).
- How many affectedAffected persons: 6,720 · Deaths: 34
- What help is neededFlash floods caused by heavy Gu rains in April 2020 led to the contamination of water sources that led to an increase in the number of cholera cases in Banadir (4144 cases), Hiran (948 cases), Middle Shabelle (560 cases), Bay (959 cases) and Lower Shabelle (109).
What changed
First retained snapshot
No earlier verified snapshot is present in the recovered dataset. This record remains available as the historical baseline.
Situation
17 January 2021 – The Ministry of Health of Somalia has announced 68 new suspected cases of cholera, with no reported death, for epidemiological week 2 (4 -10 January 2021). In week 2, all of the cases were reported from 12 districts of Banadir region as well as Baidoa district of Bay region, with no cholera cases reported from other regions. The cumulative total number of suspected cholera cases from January 2020 is 6720, including 34 associated deaths (CFR 0.5%). Since 2020, active transmission has been reported from the regions of Banadir, Bay, Hiran and lower Shabele. The last cholera cases in Jowhar district of middle Shabelle were reported in week 17 of 2020. Of the 6720 reported cases, 3087 (46%) are aged 2 years and below, while 19 (56%) of the 34 registered deaths are aged 2 years and below. The current cholera outbreak started in December 2017 following floods that affected districts in the basins of Jubba and Shabelle rivers. It was contained in five of the six regions while active transmission has continued to be reported from Banadir. Flash floods caused by heavy Gu rains in April 2020 led to the contamination of water sources that led to an increase in the number of cholera cases in Banadir (4144 cases), Hiran (948 cases), Middle Shabelle (560 cases), Bay (959 cases) and Lower Shabelle (109). Of the 34 deaths reported since week 1 of 2020, 23 (67%) were reported in Banadir region. Of the 628 stool samples tested since January 2020, a total of 190 samples came out positive for Vibrio cholerae, Serotype V. Cholerae Inaba was isolated from stool samples collected from Baidoa. This strain in sensitive to tetracycline, chloramphenicol and ciprofloxacin. The overall reduction in the number of new cholera cases as compared to the numbers at the beginning of the outbreak is attributed to improved implementation of preventive interventions including oral cholera vaccination (OCV) campaigns and the strengthening of water, sanitation and hygiene (WaSH) activities in hot spots. However, the current floods and cholera outbreak occurred at a time when COVID-19 cases are increasing in all regions of Somalia, stretching the already limited capacity to respond to the cholera alerts.
Linked charities and agencies
WorldsAid verification
A WorldsAid editor reviewed this record against 1 attributed source, cleaned feed formatting and checked the crisis, place and reporting date. 2 human-impact figures were separated from the narrative and dated where the source allowed. Earlier observations remain in the evidence history instead of being silently overwritten.
Verified figures
- Affected persons
- 6,720 retained at 2021-01-17
- Deaths
- 34 retained at 2021-01-17
What we knew when
- WorldsAid record entered the retained historical dataset.
- Last verification represented by this immutable snapshot.
Earlier figures are never replaced by later values; additional observations are retained as new ledger entries.
Provenance
This page renders the last verified WorldsAid cache directly in HTML. It does not treat generated summaries as primary evidence.
Cached dataset: worldsai_drup771.sql.gz
Verified
SHA-256 4d29bbe0b5c68e605fff53052c9072649796fc6a256d92c86b57da773cb20456