District health administrator Tureng Tamba said cholera had never reached Papua New Guinea but the risk to PNG was mainly from border crossers from the Indonesian border area.
He said, however, that cholera may occur in persons who have eaten seafood, particularly shellfish, from a port where foreign vessels have discharged waste or ballast.
“In our situation, the villages affected were people living along the coast where they mainly rely on fishing,” he said.
He said the villagers may have contracted cholera after eating shellfish that may have fed on human waste discharged from a passing foreign vessel from an infected person.
He said the disease may have spread from person to person through contaminated hands.
“This is what we think, however we have to confirm with an epidermis how the disease was contracted,” he added.
