Meningitis cause of KumAca deaths not food poisoning – Minister

The Ashanti regional Minister, Simon Osei Mensah has revealed that the four students who died at the Kumasi Academy in the Ashanti region died from meningitis and not food poisoning.

The four students died over a ten-day period with colleague students and parents of the deceased suspecting the cause of death to be food poisoning.

Terrified students abandoned academic work and fled the campus for fear of suffering a similar fate.

But after an autopsy was conducted on the bodies of the students, it has been revealed that they did not die from food poisoning.

Addressing a press conference Wednesday, Mr. Osei stated that through collaboration between the Ghana Health Service (GHS) and doctors from the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital, “the cause of the deaths has been identified as meningitis”.

He added that 26 more cases have been identified and health officials have intensified surveillance to contain the disease and prevent further outbreak.

Authorities of the school are currently putting in place measures to decongest some of the dormitories in order to contain the spread of the disease.

Meningitis is usually caused by bacteria or viruses, but can be a result of injury, cancer, or certain drugs.

The type of meningitis is, however, yet to be identified as the doctors conduct further tests.