SEOUL, Aug 24 — South Korea has confirmed its first case of cholera in 15 years in a man who had seafood during his trip to the southern coast earlier this month, local health authorities said yesterday.

South Korea’s Yonhap news agency reports that a 59-year-old man from the southern city of Gwangju was confirmed to have been infected with the water-borne disease, the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC) said, adding the man doesn’t have any records of overseas travel this year.

The patient was presumed to have contracted the disease from seafood he had while travelling around the nation’s southern coast with his family from August 7 to 8, health authorities said.

Inspections are currently under way at local restaurants they visited, officials said, suspecting the cholera bacteria may have been in imported seafood.

They said his wife tested negative for cholera in an initial test and that they plan to examine his son and daughter today.

It marks the first time that a South Korean national has been infected with the disease on local soil since 2001, the KCDC said.

In 2001, an outbreak hit the Gyeongsang region in southern South Korea, infecting 162 people.

The diarrheal disease, which is curable with proper medication and treatment, affects three million to five million people annually and claims more than 100,000 lives throughout the world. — Bernama