An outbreak of Cholera has killed 21 people in areas controlled by the Kachin Independence Organization (KIO), a ceasefire group in Kachin State, northern Burma, said KIO officials.

The outbreak of the disease was first noticed in Pung Shwe Yang village and its surrounding villages in the Triangle Areas under the KIO's 1st brigade in northern Kachin State, during the period August 20 and September 25, said a spokesperson of the Central Health Department of the KIO.

The people afflicted died within three days of showing symptoms of continuous diarrhea, vomiting, fever and coughing, a KIO official of the 1st brigade said.

However, many lives could be saved because the KIO took prompt action by sending a special medical team from the KIO headquarters in Laiza on the Sino-Burma border. The KIO also initiated measures to prevent the disease from spreading to other villages. It prohibited travelers from outside to the disease-affected areas, said a KIO health official.

The villagers in Pung Shwe Yang were seriously affected by Cholera after the stream near the village was flooded. The villagers rely on the stream for drinking water, according to KIO medical personnel who visited the village.

The Burmese military junta also sent a medical team with four persons led by Dr. Aung Ko Latt from the Public General Hospital in Myitkyina, the capital of Kachin State to the worst affected areas in Pung Shwe Yang for two weeks, KIO officials said.

In the past, Cholera had seriously infected people in the Triangle Areas. Many villagers in some villages died, said a KIO official of the 1st brigade headquarters in N-gumla.

The major reason behind Cholera infecting people in the Triangle Areas has to do with them relying on drinking water from streams flowing down from the forests and the hills. They drink the water without boiling it, said KIO officials.