Some 218 people have been hospitalized in the central Russian city of Kazan following a suspected outbreak of cholera, RIA Novosti quoted medical officials as saying Wednesday.
At least 33 people had already been diagnosed with the bacteria, which the victims caught after swimming in a city lake.
However a senior health ministry official said the situation in Kazan should be "fully normalised within two or three days."
"We believe the situation has peaked," Yury Fyodorov, head of the ministry's sanitation department, said on Echo Moscow radio.
"The situation will improve, irrespective of whether a few more cases of the illness break out," he said, ruling out any necessity for a quarantine.
Russia's deputy health minister Gennady Onishchenko, sent to the region to deal with the crisis, ruled out imposing a quarantine on the city earlier in the week.
The ponds believed to have caused the outbreak were being filled in and control over unauthorised street vendors of food products has been tightened, ITAR-TASS news agency quoted Onishchenko as saying -- MOSCOW (AFP)
© 2001 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
