Cholera can be treated by oral rehydration therapy, electrolytes and antibiotics. It is also useful to continue to breastfeed a baby with diarrhoea and adults and older children should continue to eat frequently.
Oral rehydration therapy is an effective and simple treatment, in which rice-based solutions are preferred to be used. It is to regain fluids when a person is dehydrated.
Electrolytes is needed to be replaced because although large losses have occurred, the potassium level may normal. But as dehydration is treated, potassium levels may decrease quickly.
Antibiotics treatments for 1 to 3 days can shorten the course of the disease and reduce the severity of the symptoms. However, people will also recover without them.
To avoid cholera, sanitation practices must be effectively carried out. Excreta produced by cholera patients must be treated carefully and completely sterilized before going to other water source. The clothes of the patient should also be sterilized. Also, all water used for drinking, washing or cooking should be sterilized by boiling, chlorination, ultraviolet light sterilization etc.
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based Diseases
Water based diseases are diseases caused by aquatic organisms that spend part of their life cycle in the water and another part as parasite of animals. As parasites, they are usually in the form of worms, using intermediate animal vectors e.g. snails to thrive and directly infecting human by boring through the skin or by being swallowed.
An example of water based diseases is dracunculasis or guinea worm disease. It is an infection caused by the parasite Dracunculus medinensis, a very long and thin roundworm.
A person would get the infection when they drink water contaminated with the larvae of the guinea worm. Adult female guinea worms emerge from the skin of the infected person annually. The person with worms protruding through the skin may enter sources of drinking water and allow the worm to release larvae into the water. The larvae would then be ingested by fresh water copepods and develop into an infective stage. Then the person who drinks the contaminated water would become infected.
Infected people don’t usually have symptoms until about a year after the infection. First, a blister will be formed, usually on the leg. Then, the person may experience itching, fever, swelling and burning sensations called “the fiery serpent”. Also, as the worm moves downwards to the lower leg, it would lead to intense pain to its path of travel.
Infected may try to relief the pain by immersing the infected area in the water, usually open water sources such as ponds, which can allow the worms to spread.
There isn’t any medicine or vaccine to treat Guinea worm disease. Once a person is infected, the person must wrap the live worm around a piece of gauze or a stick to extract it from the body. It is a long and painful process which last for weeks or months.
The disease can only be transmitted through drinking contaminated water, so it can be prevented in relatively simple ways. The drinking water drawn from underground sources must be free from any contamination. Drinking water can be filtered using a fine-mesh cloth filter like nylon to remove the guinea worm-containing crustaceans. Also, people with the disease should avoid entering open water sources such as ponds and wells used for drinking water. Larvicides can also be used to kill worm-carrying crustaceans
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