Dec. 8 (Bloomberg) -- Zimbabwe advised residents to avoid handshakes and body contact in an effort to curb the spread of a cholera epidemic that has killed at least 565 people.

“It is well known that shaking hands, as is our custom, can spread cholera, especially at public gatherings like funerals and weddings,” Health Minister David Parirenyatwa said in a telephone interview today. “We are urging Zimbabweans to uphold high standards of personal hygiene in our effort to curb the outbreak.”

Many of capital city Harare’s 4 million people have been without water in recent weeks after state-owned Zimbabwe National Water Authority ran out of chemicals at its purification plants. Cholera, mainly spread through contaminated water and food and poor sanitation, causes severe diarrhea and vomiting that can lead to death. The outbreak in Zimbabwe has infected at least 12,546 people.

Soap, along with most basic commodities, is also in short supply in the southern African nation, now in its 10th year of economic recession.

“Cholera infections seem to be stabilizing in Harare with about 300 to 350 cases a day,” Parirenyatwa said. “In Beitbridge, I am told infections are starting to fall.”

Harare and Beitbridge, a frontier town on the border with South Africa, recorded the worst rates of cholera infection. Beitbridge, one of southern Africa’s hottest towns, is sub- Saharan Africa’s busiest border post.

South African government doctors are treating cholera patients who cross the border from Zimbabwe. These doctors are also advising people not to shake hands, Mulimisi Ramavhuya, a South African doctor in Musina, 10 miles (16 kilometers) from Beitbridge, said in a telephone interview today.

To contact the reporters on this story: Brian Latham via Johannesburg at Jkew1@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: December 8, 2008 05:05 EST