Overview
- Health officials confirmed on Wednesday that additional positive laboratory tests have raised the number of confirmed Shigella infections among Mar Baselios schoolchildren to nine.
- Between roughly 300 and 500 people across Wayanad, Kozhikode and other districts have reported shigellosis-like symptoms, with about 45 patients currently hospitalised and most described as stable.
- A four-year-old child who had been treated at Kozhikode Medical College died after contracting Shigella earlier in the cluster, a development that prompted the statewide alert.
- The Kerala government has deployed expert teams, ordered chlorination of wells, instructed food-safety inspections at roadside eateries, directed siblings of cases to quarantine, and closed schools in affected areas until June 14.
- Many stool and water samples remain pending, so investigators have not yet confirmed a single source; public-health guidance stresses handwashing, boiled or treated water, hydration and antibiotic use only when guided by susceptibility testing.