The Zimbabwe government has declared the recent outbreak of cholera in the country as national emergencies and called on the donor community to provide aid in fighting the disease, the state media Herald reported on Thursday.

It was declared by the Zimbabwe government on Wednesday, the Herald said.

According to the figures by the Zimbabwe government, the outbreak of cholera has so far killed 563 people and caused the malfunctioning of central hospitals.

Zimbabwe Minister of Health and Child Welfare David Parirenyatwa said Wednesday that there is a critical shortage of resources in the health sector, according to the Herald.

The minister made the remarks at a meeting of stakeholders to mobilize resources for fighting cholera which was held in the capital.

Parirenyatwa pointed out that the hospitals are in urgent need of drugs, food and equipment.

"Our central hospitals are literally not functioning. Our staff is demotivated and we need your support to ensure that they start coming to work and our health system is revived," Parirenyatwa said.

The Herald quoted the minister as saying that among the items urgently required by hospitals are medicines, laboratory reagents, renal and laundry equipment, X-ray films and boilers.

The minister also said renal patients require dialysis.

"The emergency appeal will help us reduce the morbidity and mortality associated with the current socioeconomic environment by December 2009," the minister said.

"We are hoping that within the next 12 months we would have achieved the package," Parirenyatwa said.

He confirmed that since the outbreak of cholera, 563 people had died of the disease throughout the country as of Tuesday.

"There has been a reduction in the number of cholera cases in the past days from all provinces except for Harare where all cases are still being linked to Budiriro. We still have a challenge of controlling the movement of people in an effort to curb further prevalence of the outbreak."

Deputy Minister of Water and Infrastructure Development Walter Mzembi, who also attended the meeting, said his ministry had water treatment chemicals enough to last the next 12 weeks.

"I am appealing for at least 40 million Rand (about 3.89 million US dollars) to purchase chemicals for the next two months and the money is needed between now and next Monday," the Herald quoted Mzembi as saying.  

According to the state media, donors who included United Nation agencies, embassies and non-governmental organizations pledged to assist the Zimbabwe government address the critical needs within the specified period.

United Nations Development Program country representative Agostinho Zacarias said the current problems facing Zimbabwe's health sector needed a co-ordinated response.

"We need to pool our resources together and see how best we can respond to this emergency," he said.

World Health Organization representative Custodia Mandlate said while there has been overwhelming response from the donor community pledging to assist the government of Zimbabwe, the Ministry of Health and Child Welfare should take a leadership and stewardship role in revamping the health sector.  

(Xinhua News Agency December 4, 2008)