Sindh's Health and Local Government departments and humanitarian development agencies' less than satisfactory involvement in ensuring potable water and proper sanitation facilities in the flood-ravaged districts has resulted in increased health risks, especially viral and waterborne diseases, for the affected people living in those districts, Business Recorder learnt on Tuesday.
Sources in these departments told Business Recorder that 87 percent of the total available water sources have become unfit for drinking purposes due to addition of rainwater and agricultural waste when floods wreaked havoc on the province. "If this situation continues and the government takes no notice, an epidemic of abdominal diseases could hit these areas and women and children, especially minors, could suffer the most. Due to unhygienic conditions prevalent in the province, a cholera outbreak could also occur," sources said.
Sources revealed that neither the government's health and local government departments nor the humanitarian development agencies have met the required targets, and the needs of only 15 percent of the affectees have been met in the WASH sector, which is not enough to tackle the challenges faced by the underprivileged flood survivors and is increasing their miseries.
It is an alarming situation that around 2.2 million women and children have been directly hit in the highly affected districts, because no adequate response in the WASH sector was ensured when the flood survivors settled in relief camps, they said. They said that more than 3 million flood survivors were in urgent need of potable water and proper sanitation and hygiene education during the emergency relief services, and 1.2 million affectees are still waiting for response in these sectors.
They underlined the need of meeting the immediate requirements of the survivors in the WASH sector in the early recovery framework, asking for the restoration of basic structures of latrines, providing access to protected water for drinking, and ensuring proper sanitation, drainage and waste management facilities, which remain critical issues in the affected areas.
The recent heavy rains/flood have reduced access to piped drinking water for the affectees and increased the number of people relying on unprotected and untreated sources of water, they reported. And observed that people are deprived of potable water in the affected areas because damage to hand pumps and piped water have rendered them unusable and people are resorting to alternative, often unprotected water sources. They disclosed that after devastation by rains/flood an estimated one million people are using unprotected water sources.
Moreover, they added, that many people have been displaced and are currently living in roadside camps where water supply might be limited. They said that it is likely that incidences of waterborne infectious diseases would be increased due to a decline in the use of protected water sources and limited practice of water treatment.
They also said that 40 percent of the protected water sources are not yet functional, 32 percent are partially damaged, and 8 percent are completely non-functional. Similarly, they added, 49 percent of the piped water and 58 percent of the tanker sources are entirely non-functional as well. They said that due to the poor response and failure in providing proper washing facilities to the affectees, the environment has become more polluted as waste matter is being released in rivers, streams, canals and water channels.
Comments
Comments are closed.