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will receive 600,000 doses of a cholera vaccine to help combat theÌý in the country, Public Health MinisterÌýFiras al-Abyad said Wednesday.

Lebanon will receive the vaccines within the next two weeks after the World Health Organisation approved a request for them, Abyad said at a press conference.

Health sector workers, followed byÌýinmates at Lebanon's crowded prisons, will be high on the priority list for the jabs,Ìý°®Âþµº's Arabic-language siteÌýAl-Araby Al-Jadeed , citing sources in the health ministry.

Lebanon recorded the first case in its current outbreak of cholera on 6 October - it is alsoÌý.

It has recorded a total of 346 confirmed cases of cholera andÌý14 associated deaths since the outbreak began, the health ministry Wednesday.

International charities have warned that case numbers in Lebanon and in neighbouring Syria will continue to grow quickly.ÌýSave the Children Thursday that cholera cases in Lebanon had almost doubled in the space of a week.

Syria has seen over 20,000 cases of choleraÌýand scores of related deaths, with the disease now having been detected .

Cholera is typically spread through contaminated water, food or sewage. It can cause severe diarrhoea and dehydration which can kill if left untreated.

Charities have warned that it will spread rapidly in Lebanon and in Syria, particularly in camps for refugees and the displaced, where clean water is often scarce.

Most cholera cases in Lebanon have been detected in the camps, Abyad has previously said.