Mumps in SA | NICD confirms outbreak but says no reason to panic

JOHANNESBURG - The National Institute for Communicable Diseases has confirmed an outbreak of mumps in South Africa.

KwaZulu-Natal, Mpumalanga and Gauteng account for the majority of confirmed cases.

Mumps vaccines are also not universally available in the public health sector.

But the NICD's Kerrigan McCarthy says there's absolutely no reason to panic.

''Mumps is a benign self-limited disease with few complications," she said.

"There is no vaccine for mumps in the expanded programme of immunisation at the moment. The reason for this is that over 60 percent of cases of mumps are asymptomatic."

McCarthy said there are no recorded fatalities due to mumps.

"In South Africa, the NICD doesn't do surveilance for mumps because it's not a notifiable disease, and it's also not regarded as a major public health problem in the country," she said.

"We know that there is an outbreak."