海地霍乱已蔓延至多米尼加

The Dominican Republic has detected its first case of cholera¹, following the outbreak of the disease in neighbouring Haiti last month.

多米尼加共和国已检测到第一例霍乱病例，可能因其邻国海地上月爆发霍乱导致。

The patient is a Haitian migrant who had recently returned from his homeland, the health minister said.

The Dominican authorities had stepped up border controls and health checks to try to stop cholera from spreading from Haiti.

More than 1,000 Haitians have died of the disease.

Dominican health minister Bautista Rojas said the patient, a 32-year-old Haitian construction worker, was being treated in isolation² in the eastern town of Higuey.

Like Haiti, the Dominican Republic had not had a confirmed case of cholera（霍乱） in more than a century until this year.

In Haiti, the government says 1,034 people have died and the disease is still spreading rapidly.

'Drastic measures'

The charity Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) said its treatment centres in the capital, Port-au-Prince, were being overwhelmed（打击，压倒） by new patients.

"If the number of cases continues to increase at the same rate, then we are going to have to adopt some drastic（激烈的，猛烈的） measures to be able to treat people," said MSF's head of mission Stefano Zannini.

"I can easily see this situation deteriorating³（退化，恶化） to the point where patients are lying in the street, waiting for treatment."

The epidemic⁴ has provoked fear and anger in Haiti. The country was already struggling to recover from a devastating⁵ earthquake in January which killed about 230,000 people in and around the capital Port-au-Prince and shattered（打碎，削弱） its already poor infrastructure⁶.

On Monday two people died during violent protests against UN peacekeepers, whom some Haitians accuse of bringing cholera into Haiti.

At least one of the men was shot dead by the UN troops.

There were further clashes between youths and peacekeepers in several towns on Tuesday.

Haitian president Rene Preval has appealed for calm.

"Disorder⁷ and instability have never brought solutions to a country going through hard times," Mr Preval said.

"Gunshots, throwing bottles, barricades⁸ of burning tyres will not help us eradicate⁹（根除，灭绝） cholera. On the contrary, it will prevent the sick from receiving care."

President Preval also accused unnamed groups of exploiting the cholera epidemic to provoke（驱使，激怒） popular unrest against the government and the UN mission, Minustah, ahead of presidential elections due on 28 November.

The UN has said there is no evidence to support allegations that cholera was brought into Haiti by peacekeepers from Nepal, where the disease in endemic（地方病） .