Cholera has officially arrived in the world's largest city and has caused at least one death, while the total number of confirmed cases of the illness in Mexico has risen to 696, health authorities said.
The Mexican Health Ministry said the victim was an adult male who suffered from "serious diarrhea," and was treated in a city hospital.Officials said the man had contracted the illness after visiting one of the rural areas in the country where cholera outbreaks have been reported.
Some 20 million people live in Mexico City, many in conditions of extreme poverty and lacking in basic health and sanitary facilities. But officials insisted that the city does not present the type of unsanitary conditions that would make a cholera outbreak likely.