Typhoid fever outbreak in Madaya Township, Mandalay Division, Myanmar, September 2000

Abstract

In September 2000, an outbreak of typhoid fever was reported in a rural village of Central Myanmar. The authors investigated the outbreak in the affected village. A suspected case was a person suffering from fever with either constipation, abdominal pain, diarrhoea/bloody diarrhoea. A probable case was a suspected case who had positive result on the diazo urine test or widal test. Based on probable cases, the authors conducted a case-control study comparing history of contact with the cases, water source, and personal hygiene. Control was a person living in the village was not ill and having a negative result for diazo urine test. Among 49 suspected cases, 33 were probable. Attack rate was 1.2%. Three cases had a positive culture for Salmonella typhi and were not drug resistant. The following risk factors were identified: drinking unboiled river water (adjusted OR 12.5, 95%CI 2.8-75.3), history of contact with other patients before the illness (adjusted OR 22, 95%CI 3.5-76.2), no hand washing with soap after defecation (adjusted OR 0.15, 95% CI 0.03-0.81). Environmental investigation result showed that most of the households had unsanitary latrine and some latrines were constructed near the edge of a river. The outbreak subsided quickly after intervention.