Karnataka: Panic grips Kalaburagi village following gastroenteritis

KALABURAGI: People in Dandoti village in Chittapur taluk are suffering from vomiting and loose motion for the past one week. Several women, senior citizens and children have been admitted to the taluk hospital.
Dandoti has a population of 6,600 and 1,200 families live here. More than 80 people are suffering by gastroenteritis. The taluk health department has now claimed that there was an outbreak of gastroenteritis in the village.
Every day, a few new cases are being admitted to the local hospital with complaints of vomiting, diarrhoea and other symptoms. The taluk administration has arranged for treatment of new cases in the taluk hospital as there are no beds in the village hospital.
Villagers said they don’t have a proper drinking water facility as the pipeline that supplies water to all households is almost next to the drainage line. “We have requested authorities to shift the pipeline, but it has not yet been done. One or two persons are suffering from gastroenteritis in each family in the village for the past 10 days,” said a villager.
Shambu Warad, and others alleged that more than 150 persons were affected due to GE and one person also died from it, but the taluk administration has not reported this death to the government. It has also given incorrect data on the number of affected persons, they said.
Taluk health officer Dr Amardeep Pawar told TOI that people are suffering from gastroenteritis in the village after consuming contaminated water.
“The problems started in the village from May 3 and since then fresh cases of GE are being reported. After assessing the situation, we have declared an outbreak of gastroenteritis in Dandoti,” he said.
“We found that the water supply pipeline in the village is very close to the drainage line. As overflowing drainage got mixed with the drinking water, people fell sick,” he said.
We have formed three teams of doctors and health staff and all teams are camping in the village to create awareness about drinking clean water, boiling water before drinking and avoid drinking non-potable water from other sources.
“The water pipeline has been elevated by two feet to stop sewage from mixing with the water. We are also visiting each house and checking the condition of each person. We are immediately shifting suspected and affected persons with GE symptoms. We have also alerted people by sticking notices on some water bodies to prevent them from consuming water from such sources,” he said.
He denied allegations of death due to gastroenteritis and said, “There have been no reports of any death due to gastroenteritis and we are not hiding any information.”