By Abdallah el-Kurebe

A strange disease between Thursday and ‎Friday last week has killed three persons in Mabera area of Sokoto metropolis. 

The deceased persons, Abdullahi Lawal, a mechanic and husband of ‎one wife and five children; a 15 year old secondary school student, Bello Zoramawa and 14 year old house help, Nasiru Kamba died as a result of an unconfirmed ailment.

Newsdiaryonline investigations reveal that the symptom of the disease ‎were bleeding from the eyes and diarrhoea.

Mother of Bello, who could not reveal her name told our reporter that her son fell sick on Thursday was was treated of malaria. “But at 10pm, his temperature was very high and his body was shaking. He was taken to the hospital where he died on Friday.”

Newsdiaryonline further gathered that the house help, Nasiru ‎Kamba who stayed with him at the hospital, also developed the same symptom of high temperature, bleeding eyes and diarrhoea and subsequently died. 

Dr. Adamu Adamu of the Paediatric Unit of Usmanu Danfodiyo University Teaching Hospital (UDUTH) told a team of news men that the symptom was not known ‎”because Bello was not diagnosed of the disease before he died.”

Reacting to inquiries from news men, the deputy director of Public Health at the Ministry of Health, Mallam Abbas Aliyu said that ‎the Ministry dispatched the state’s Rapid Response Team (RRT) to the area immediately they got the report.

“The team visited the area but could not collect any sample because the victims had already died. Although this is a sign of viral haemorrhagic  fever, our surveillance team is still at work for any possible outbreak,” Aliyu said.

He confirmed that a Doctor at UDUTH queried severe malaria. “Preliminary report from the Doctor who attended to the patient in UDUTH before his death queried severe malaria.”