Abstract

Acute food poisoning outbreak among students of Kufa Kasa primary school, Babille District, East Hararghe zone, Oromia region, Ethiopia, 2018  (Haramaya University College Health and Medical science, School of Public Health Field epidemiology department), email:hikawakjira@gmail.com, phone No: - 0964101496 Hika Wakjira¹, Hirbo Shore² (Mph), Lama Bogale³ (Mph),

Background:  In April 17, 2018, an acute illness outbreak was reported in school students eating porridge prepared from Maize and bean soup supplied by the school feeding program in Kufa Kasa primary school Babille district, East Hararghe Zone, Oromia Region, Ethiopia. We investigated this outbreak to describe the illness in terms of person, place and time, develop the timeline of events, and determine the risk factors and its sources associated.

Methods: A retrospective cohort study was used to investigate the outbreak. We defined exposed cases as students from affected schools reporting any two symptoms including abdominal pain, vomiting, and nausea after eating the porridge   on the day of illness. We conducted a questionnaire survey both exposed and unexposed students to determine the symptoms and ascertain food items eaten 12 hours before illness onset, and microbiological and environmental investigations by taking sample from the food, salt, oil and over left porridge to identify the specific cause.

Results: 120 students were interviewed from this 70 students were ill .The overall attack rate was 63.3%.  48.7% of the case shows vomiting, 25% shows   abdominal pain followed by nausea 21.1% symptom reported from respondent. The food preparation environment was strongly lack of sanitation and food storage room was not suitable for food storage.  Strong  association  was  found  between illness and consumption of under cooked porridge  supporting the hypothesis that under cooked porridge  from first pot was the most likely cause of the outbreak by(RR: 31.8; 95% CI: 10.1 –99.8). The microbiological investigations done by Ethiopian Food, Medicine and Health care Administration and Control Authorities laboratory shows that the cause is bacterial of food poisoning Staphylococcus aurous,

Conclusion: Most likely according to the result Consuming of undercooked porridge was cause of this outbreak. We recommend routine testing of commercial flour before presenting for school feeding program and awareness creation for food handlers on hygiene and duration of cooking time.

Keywords: Cohort, porridge, outbreak, attack rate