BOGOTA (AFP) – Colombia has declared a national health and economic emergency over a deadly yellow fever outbreak, with the government urging people to get vaccinated and take precautions while travelling over Easter weekend.
The mosquito-borne virus, which typically causes fever, muscle pains, nausea and headaches, is endemic to multiple countries in South America, including Colombia, where the current outbreak has had a high mortality rate.
At least 34 people have died among 74 confirmed cases since the start of the year, Minister of Health Guillermo Jaramillo told state-run Radio Nacional de Colombia.
“It’s a disease with a mortality rate of nearly 50 per cent among those infected,” he said while explaining the emergency decree.
The virus has also spread beyond the rural regions traditionally considered at risk for outbreaks, “making it a threat to more communities”, he said.
The most severe situation is in the coffee-growing Tolima area, where the number of detected yellow fever cases rose from four in September 2024 to 22 by mid-April, according to Jaramillo.
“We are going to require the carrying of the vaccination card for people entering or leaving Colombia,” he told the radio station.
Colombia’s President Gustavo Petro announced an economic emergency on top of the health decree, and called on citizens to get vaccinated.
“People who have not been vaccinated should not go to high-risk areas during Easter: for now the coffee area,” he wrote on Facebook. Petro blamed climate change for further spreading the virus by bringing the disease-carrying Aedes aegypti mosquitoes to higher altitudes.
On Tuesday, the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) upgraded its yellow fever alert for South America to level two of four, noting “an increased number of cases of yellow fever have been reported in parts of South America”.
It advised travellers to consider getting vaccinated against yellow fever or receiving booster shots before visiting some areas of Bolivia, Colombia and Peru.
