Question

- What is the negative impact of Cholera on education and health and human capital development in Kenya?

- What are the policies followed by the Kenyan government to reduce the impact of this infectious disease?

Answer 1

Impact of cholera on education and health and human human capital development-

Kenya experienced the widespread cholera outbreaks in 1997-1999 and 2007-2010 and then again in 2015.There were many factors associated with this as the relationship between cholera occurrence in Kenya and various environmental factors related to water,sanitation,education,urbanisation and availability of health facilities during that period.

Identified risk factors includes:

Water,Sanitation and hygiene factors,lack of knowledge about cholera,limited availability of health facilities,poverty and illiteracy.

If a disease has a fatal impact on individuals then it will lower the amount of labour supplied. It has major impact on the adults or workforce who participate in the labour force. Affected individuals remains in the labour force,but their productivity is severely impaired. Human capital accumulation may also be adversely affected by poor health .

However the economic impact of poor health is not restricted to the reduction in the productivity of labour. A high disease burden within the country can also have implications for foreign and domestic investment , Poor health affects the economic development firstly via total factor productivity (TFP) and this health factor also affect output growth.

Policies followed by Keynan government to reduce the impact of cholera:

The Government of Kenya esatablished a national task force to coordinate response activities.

CDC Kenya was one of many agencies who provided technical support.

Kenya also developed a national response plan to scale up response activities such as surveillance, case management and social mobilisation.

The Government of Kenya also initiated strict food hygiene standards and promoted safe food handling requirements in addition to scaling up of water,sanitation and hygiene activities.They also activated the Public Health Operating Centre for the first time .

Few residents were assigned to update lists,analyse data,developed reports,called contacts and were part of response teams.They have also participated in several investigations.

There were various measures to end the outbreak that resulted in timely case management in cholera treatment centres and reducion in disease as well.