A World Health Organization (WHO) taskforce has been sent to South Sudan to investigate an unidentified illness which has killed 89 people.

The country’s ministry of health reported that an unknown disease had killed scores of people in the northern town of Fangak in Jonglei state.

The WHO sent a rapid response team of scientists to the area, which is one of the worst hit by recent severe flooding, to collect samples from sick people, reports the BBC.

Local health officials in Fangak said initial samples from the sick returned negative results for cholera.