Post-Eid clean-up an ‘offal job’

Entrails of sacrificial animals still lying around on roadsides

KARACHI:

The stench of rotting entrails hangs in many localities of the city even a week after the Eidul Azha. Piles of offal lie in garbage dumps waiting for the city authorities to perform their post-Eid clean-up duties.

Swarms of flies and mosquitoes breeding in garbage dumps pose the threat of epidemics and avoidable diseases in the metropolis, public health officials told The Express Tribune.

Cases of diarrhea, gastroenteritis, malaria, and typhoid have increased due to the abundance of flies, they said, advising people to adopt precautionary measures and urged the government to clean the city and conduct pesticide and germicide spray campaigns.

During a survey of the city by The Express Tribune, citizens of Nazimabad Block I said that the sanitation staff of the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation was absent after making a guest appearance only on the first day of Eid.

The stench is so overwhelming near the Nazimabad Bridge that it makes many people vomit, said one local resident. The same is the state of many other localities in the Central district. "Barring some posh areas, the rest of the city becomes a mess after the Eidul Azha and with rain ready to fall anytime, the sanitary condition is likely to get worse," said Naimatullah Shadab, another resident.

Read More: Offal disposal plan finalised for Eidul Azha

People said that since the term of local government's ended nearly a year ago and the provincial government is yet to hold elections, the city is run by an administrator. But he was nowhere to be seen. The Sindh Solid Waste Management Board (SSWMB) had taken up the garbage lifting responsibility, but it also failed to deliver, said another incensed resident of a neighbourhood in Gulshan-e-Iqbal, near the Lyari Expressway.

The flies have made lives miserable, said shopkeepers and residents of a number of areas surveyed by The Express Tribune team. Swarms of flies have descended on the city spreading diseases like diarrhea and typhoid have also increased in government and private hospitals.

Meanwhile, Pediatrician Dr Iqbal Memon said that the inflow of patients of stomach ailments, typhoid, gastrointestinal infection, malaria, and respiratory diseases has increased since Eid.

He urged households to use boiled water for drinking and avoid eating from the roadside kiosks.

He also asked citizens to maintain hygiene standards at home, including mopping floors with disinfectant mixed water, washing hands with soap before eating food and after coming out of the toilet.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 31^st, 2021.