![MSF team providing healthcare services to people of Maban County in Upper Nile State [Photo by MSF team/Sudans Post]](https://i0.wp.com/www.sudanspost.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/MSF128099_Medium.jpg?resize=1000%2C664&ssl=1)
The 20-bed facility has so far treated 45 cholera patients and recorded two deaths, according to Emanuele Montobbio, MSF’s field coordinator for the Renk emergency program.
“Given the inadequate, overcrowded living conditions and continued influx of refugees and returnees from Sudan into Renk and Malakal, there is an imminent urgent need for a response to improve the water, sanitation, and hygiene situation to prevent further spread of the disease,” MSF said in a statement on Thursday.
Montobbio called on organizations in Upper Nile State to collaborate in efforts to contain the spread of cholera.
He highlighted that most cholera cases stem from arrivals from Sudan, where a cholera outbreak was declared in August 2024.
Local residents of Renk have also been affected, he said, due to water contamination, open defecation, and overcrowding as new arrivals continue to flood in from Sudan.
“In the past weeks, an average of up to 800 people are entering Renk daily from Sudan, fleeing from the war in the country,” Montobbio said.
The outbreak was officially declared on October 27 by South Sudan’s Ministry of Health in collaboration with the World Health Organization (WHO), after six cholera cases were confirmed on October 8 at Wunthou Primary Care Center.
Renk serves as a key transit hub for refugees and returnees escaping the conflict between Sudan’s Armed Forces and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces.
According to the UN refugee agency (UNHCR), South Sudan is currently hosting over 810,000 people, including refugees and returnees who have fled violence in Sudan since mid-April 2023.
