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What you should know about this indicator

  • These statistics include cholera cases confirmed clinically, epidemiologically, or by laboratory investigation.
  • As not every case of cholera is confirmed and reported to the WHO, these numbers are likely to be an underestimate of the true number of cholera cases.
  • In outbreak situations, cases of acute watery diarrhea caused by other pathogens may be reported as cholera cases when laboratory confirmation is not available or feasible for all suspected cases.

How is this data described by its producer - WHO?

Definition

Confirmed cholera cases, including those confirmed clinically, epidemiologically, or by laboratory investigation. Cases that have been discarded following laboratory investigation should not be included.

Method of estimation

WHO transmits data as reported by national authorities (ministries of health). Type of statistics: unadjusted

Cholera reported cases
WHO
Number of cases which have been reported to the WHO by local authorities. As testing and reporting is limited in many countries, this is likely to be an underestimate of the true number of cholera cases.
Source
World Health Organization (2026) – with major processing by Our World in Data
Last updated
August 18, 2026
Next expected update
August 2027
Date range
1949–2024
Unit
reported cases

Sources and processing

This data is based on the following sources

World Health Organization – Cholera cases and deaths

Interactive dashboard of cholera cases and deaths officially reported by WHO Member States annually since 2000, in aggregated form. All WHO Member States are encouraged to report annually to WHO on the occurrence, or absence of occurrence, of cholera, including "zero reporting" when no cases were detected. Annual figures might be subject to reporting biases, including lack of comparability of reporting criteria between countries, lack of stability of cholera surveillance systems over time, over-reporting, under-reporting, and absence of reporting.

Retrieved on
August 18, 2026
Retrieved from
https://www.who.int/emergencies/surveillance/cholera-cases-and-deaths
Citation
This is the citation of the original data obtained from the source, prior to any processing or adaptation by Our World in Data. To cite data downloaded from this page, please use the suggested citation given in Reuse This Work below.
Cholera dashboard - World Health Organization (WHO), Geneva, 2026. https://worldhealthorg.shinyapps.io/Cholera/

Interactive dashboard of cholera cases and deaths officially reported by WHO Member States annually since 2000, in aggregated form. All WHO Member States are encouraged to report annually to WHO on the occurrence, or absence of occurrence, of cholera, including "zero reporting" when no cases were detected. Annual figures might be subject to reporting biases, including lack of comparability of reporting criteria between countries, lack of stability of cholera surveillance systems over time, over-reporting, under-reporting, and absence of reporting.

Retrieved on
August 18, 2026
Retrieved from
https://www.who.int/emergencies/surveillance/cholera-cases-and-deaths
Citation
This is the citation of the original data obtained from the source, prior to any processing or adaptation by Our World in Data. To cite data downloaded from this page, please use the suggested citation given in Reuse This Work below.
Cholera dashboard - World Health Organization (WHO), Geneva, 2026. https://worldhealthorg.shinyapps.io/Cholera/

World Health Organization – Global Health Observatory

The GHO data repository is WHO's gateway to health-related statistics for its 194 Member States. It provides access to over 1000 indicators on priority health topics including mortality and burden of diseases, the Millennium Development Goals (child nutrition, child health, maternal and reproductive health, immunization, HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria, neglected diseases, water and sanitation), non communicable diseases and risk factors, epidemic-prone diseases, health systems, environmental health, violence and injuries, equity among others.

Retrieved on
May 22, 2026
Retrieved from
https://www.who.int/data/gho
Citation
This is the citation of the original data obtained from the source, prior to any processing or adaptation by Our World in Data. To cite data downloaded from this page, please use the suggested citation given in Reuse This Work below.
World Health Organization. 2026. Global Health Observatory data repository. http://www.who.int/gho/en/.

The GHO data repository is WHO's gateway to health-related statistics for its 194 Member States. It provides access to over 1000 indicators on priority health topics including mortality and burden of diseases, the Millennium Development Goals (child nutrition, child health, maternal and reproductive health, immunization, HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria, neglected diseases, water and sanitation), non communicable diseases and risk factors, epidemic-prone diseases, health systems, environmental health, violence and injuries, equity among others.

Retrieved on
May 22, 2026
Retrieved from
https://www.who.int/data/gho
Citation
This is the citation of the original data obtained from the source, prior to any processing or adaptation by Our World in Data. To cite data downloaded from this page, please use the suggested citation given in Reuse This Work below.
World Health Organization. 2026. Global Health Observatory data repository. http://www.who.int/gho/en/.

How we process data at Our World in Data

All data and visualizations on Our World in Data rely on data sourced from one or several original data providers. Preparing this original data involves several processing steps. Depending on the data, this can include standardizing country names and world region definitions, converting units, calculating derived indicators such as per capita measures, as well as adding or adapting metadata such as the name or the description given to an indicator.

At the link below you can find a detailed description of the structure of our data pipeline, including links to all the code used to prepare data across Our World in Data.

Read about our data pipeline
Notes on our processing step for this indicator
  • This dataset is compiled from two sources published by the World Health Organization (WHO):
    • Data from 1949-1999 comes from the WHO Global Health Observatory (GHO).
    • Between 2000-2016 data from the GHO is supplemented with data from the WHO Cholera Dashboard.
    • Data from 2017-2024 comes from the WHO Cholera Dashboard.
  • The regional aggregates are calculated by Our World in Data by summing the country-level data for all countries in the region. Cholera case fatality rates are calculated by dividing the number of reported deaths by the number of reported cases.

Reuse this work

  • All data produced by third-party providers and made available by Our World in Data are subject to the license terms from the original providers. Our work would not be possible without the data providers we rely on, so we ask you to always cite them appropriately (see below). This is crucial to allow data providers to continue doing their work, enhancing, maintaining and updating valuable data.
  • All data, visualizations, and code produced by Our World in Data are completely open access under the Creative Commons BY license. You have the permission to use, distribute, and reproduce these in any medium, provided the source and authors are credited.

Citations

How to cite this page

To cite this page overall, including any descriptions, FAQs or explanations of the data authored by Our World in Data, please use the following citation:

“Data Page: Cholera reported cases”, part of the following publication: Esteban Ortiz-Ospina and Max Roser (2016) - “Global Health”. Data adapted from World Health Organization. Retrieved from https://archive.ourworldindata.org/20260820-120015/grapher/number-reported-cases-of-cholera.html [online resource] (archived on August 20, 2026).

How to cite this data

In-line citationIf you have limited space (e.g. in data visualizations), you can use this abbreviated in-line citation:

World Health Organization (2026) – with major processing by Our World in Data

Full citation

World Health Organization (2026) – with major processing by Our World in Data. “Cholera reported cases – WHO” [dataset]. World Health Organization, “Cholera cases and deaths”; World Health Organization, “Global Health Observatory” [original data]. Retrieved August 20, 2026 from https://archive.ourworldindata.org/20260820-120015/grapher/number-reported-cases-of-cholera.html (archived on August 20, 2026).

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