Nigeria police order anti-cholera measures over northeast outbreak

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Police in Nigeria said they were enforcing sanitation measures in the northeastern state of Borno on Saturday, where a cholera outbreak has killed dozens.

Some 39 people have died from the waterborne disease across Borno in recent weeks, with at least 4,204 infected, according to the latest figures from local health authorities.

The outbreak is concentrated in Borno capital Maiduguri and the surrounding Jere district, health authorities reported in an update Tuesday.

The state police commissioner "has directed the full enforcement of the monthly environmental sanitation exercise", the Borno State Police Command said in a statement late Friday evening.

"Residents are therefore urged to actively participate in the exercise by cleaning their homes, business premises, drainage channels, and surrounding environments," the statement added.

"To ensure compliance, police personnel and other relevant stakeholders will be deployed to strategic locations across the state during the sanitation period."

The state government meanwhile has set up dedicated treatment centres.

Cholera is spread by bacteria-tainted water and food, and can cause dehydration and diarrhoea.

Modern sewage treatment has all but eliminated the disease in much of the rich world.

But war, conflict and poverty -- all familiar to Borno state, the epicentre of a long-running jihadist insurgency -- are major risk factors for an outbreak.