Matthew Cochrane – the communications manager for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Socieities based in Johannesburg, South Africa – is in Zimbabwe this week with the Zimbabwe Red Cross to cover how they are helping people affected by the cholera epidemic and food crisis that is crippling the country. Here’s the first installment of his daily dairy:

Kwekwe, Zimbabwe – Since last Wednesday (January, 28 2009), the small clinic at Kwekwe has received 131 cholera patients. The clinic – set up to provide basic outpatient services – was overwhelmed. On Saturday, when the Red Cross arrived, the building was full to overflowing. The ward was chaotic: severe cases lay alongside mild cases, and in the midst of it all lay three bodies wrapped in plastic.

One of them wasn’t longer than two feet – a child.

We arrived as the tent was being erected in the clinic’s yard by a team of Zimbabwe Red Cross volunteers. It’ll be up and running on Monday, and will provide treatment and medication for the more serious cases.

We jumped back in the car and headed to Tiger Reef, a small mining town about 20 minutes west of Kwekwe. Almost all of the cases seen at the clinic had come from here and the Zimbabwe Red Cross had decided to focus a lot of their public outreach efforts here.

We met Helen Hawkings from the British Red Cross, and joined her as she headed off to the bus stop – the local gathering point on a lazy Sunday afternoon.

Information is the key in a cholera outbreak. The illness is so easy to prevent – it’s really just about basic hygiene. So there is a huge amount of work being done by the Red Cross to sensitize communities to the risks they face, and share with them the simple steps they can take to dramatically reduce these risks.

But Tiger Reef is a mess. The community hasn’t had running water for months – not since the mining company failed to pay the electricity bill – and the only toilets are the modest public ones. You can imagine what they look like.

A crowd of about 300 people gathered around Helen and two young Red Cross volunteers. The frustration was palpable. How, the community asked, can we deal with this cholera, when we don’t have toilets and we have to walk three kilometres to the river to get water?

“We know you are frustrated,” said Helen. “We know that these frustrations didn’t arrive last week. But last week, there was a serious outbreak of cholera.

“Right now, we can’t fix the long-term problems, but we can make sure that you don’t get sick.”

Filed under: International