Longsuffering residents of Zimbabwe's capital, Harare, may anticipate gradual and incremental improvements in public water supplies as municipal authorities spend more than US$10 million on purification chemicals and equipment repairs, a senior city official said Thursday.
Harare Deputy Mayor Emmanuel Chiroto said US$10 million received from the Finance Ministry plus funds from international donors is being spent on water purification chemicals and repairs to the capital's dilapidated water distribution system.
Chiroto said the improvements should help reduce the incidence of cholera in the capital and in the high-density suburbs or townships that have been hit hard by the epidemic. Some have gone without running water for months at a time over the past two years.
The World Health Organization said 4,082 have died of cholera in Zimbabwe since the disease took hold in August 2008, with 93,046 cases recorded through Wednesday.
