While brain eating amoeba claims lives, govt depts pass the buck

No measures were taken until DG's statement appeared on July 22

HYDERABAD:

The threat of naegleria fowleri and other water-borne diseases still remains a challenge for the district governments in Hyderabad while departments keep shifting responsibilities of measures and paperwork on each other.

On July 22, nearly 11 days after the brain eating amoeba reportedly took lives of two persons in Karachi hospitals, the Sindh health department in a press release informed that the concerned departments have been asked to adopt concrete measures to avoid the spread of the disease.

The first death caused by the pathogen had occurred in Karachi on July 5 while one of the three deceased persons belonged to Hyderabad. Director General Health Dr Waqar Memon further stated that the water boards in Karachi and Hyderabad have been directed to ensure that the piped water is filtered up to the standards of World Health Organisation (WHO).

"The health department had issued an advisory on June 12 in which all the concerned departments were directed to take necessary measures with regard to naegleria," he recalled. The DG emphasised that the WHO standards should be followed in water filtration so that "recurrence" of such cases can be stopped in future. The deceased who belonged to Hyderabad, 35-year-old Shakeel Ahmed Memon, died on July 11. The private hospital in Karachi instantly communicated naegleria caused death to Health Department after which a team was sent to his residence in Qasimabad to unearth the facts. The team was told by Memon's father that they suspected ablution in a mosque in their neighbourhood in Qasimabad Phase I to be the source as his son had not visited any swimming pool or water park.

The additional director Communicable Diseases Control had also written a letter to the authorities in Hyderabad to immediately focus on appropriate chlorination at the filter plants.