Zimbabwe declared a national health emergency as the cholera epidemic froze the entire health system.  Authorities also asked for help from the international community, as hospitals are running out of food, water and drug supplies. The state of emergency was declared on Wednesday by Minister of Health, David Parirenyatwa, at a government meeting.

The United Nations, whose deputies also participated at the meeting, stated that the cholera outbreak’s cause is the lack of water treatment and broken residuary water pipes. The situation is critical, as the water minister said that the authorities only have resources to chemically treat the water for 12 weeks.

Both the Red Cross and the European Commission responded to the call and will take measures to help the Zimbabwean authorities deal with the national crisis. The European Commission stated they would release 12 million dollars for drugs, water and food. The United Nations Development program director in Zimbabwe, Aghostino Zacarias, stated: "we need to pool our resources together and see how best we can respond to this emergency.”

Zimbabwe’s economic problems are very acute, as the country has the highest inflation rate in the world. Also, political compromises caused by this year’s elections are paralyzing the whole country, drawing people to protest more and more because of their poor life conditions.

Cholera is an infectious gastroenteritis disease. The infection takes place very rapidly, with dehydration, rising pulse rate, nosebleeds nausea and chronic diarrhea, the latter being the actual cause of death.  If the treatment doesn’t start right away, cholera patients die in approximately three hours.