Rohingya refugee sell clothes at Kutupalong refugee camp in Ukhia of Cox’s Bazar on Saturday. — AFP photo
At least 77 Rohingyas died from respiratory tract infection, diarrhoea and neonatal diseases while the Bangladesh government and relief agencies continued struggling to contain outbreak of diseases among more than six lakh ethnic minority people who fled violence in Myanmar.
Mortality and Morbidity Weekly Bulletin released by the Bangladesh government and World Health Organisation on October 21 said that 77 Rohingyas died of difference diseases between August 25 and October 21.
Of the 77 reported deaths, 31 were for acute respiratory infection, 10 for neonatal diseases, 10 for injury, 7 for acute watery diarrhoea, 2 each for malaria and meningitis and the remaining 15 were for other causes, said the bulletin.
Cox’s Bazar civil surgeon Abdus Salam told New Age on Saturday that the number of deaths was not abnormal as over six lakh Myanmar nationals had so far entered Bangladesh since August 25.
He, however, said that his office recorded deaths of 47 Rohingyas from different diseases.
According to UN estimation on Friday, 6,05,000 Rohingyas entered Bangladesh in the past 63 days in the new influx what the United Nations called the world’s fastest-developing refugee emergency.
Officials estimated that the new influx already took to 10.24 lakh the number of documented and undocumented Myanmar nationals in Bangladesh entering the country at times since 1978.
The new influx began after Myanmar security forces responded to Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army’s reported attacks on August 25 by launching violence what the United Nations denounced as ethnic cleansing.
Terrified, half-starved, exhausted Rohingyas continued arriving in Bangladesh trekking through hills and forests and crossing rough sea and the River Naf on boat and taking shelter wherever they could in Cox’s Bazar.
Service providers at Cox’s Bazar general hospital, upazila health complexes, community clinics, satellite clinics and aid providers’ clinics continued struggling to cope with the number of patients.
Directorate General of Health Services control room on Saturday said that 3,23,777 Rohingyas had taken treatment at indoor and outdoor medical facilities since August 26 .
Of them, 63,708 were with respiratory tract infection, 50,792 with diarrhoea, 17,009 with dysentery and 27,405 with skin diseases and others.
They, however, could not say whether all these patients took treatment once or more.
International aid groups and government health service providers repeatedly called for adequate food, safe water and sanitation facilities for Rohingyas to avert an outbreak of diseases in Cox’s Bazar.
The Mortality and Morbidity Weekly Bulletin said that between September 18 and October 21, 150 water samples from different water sources were collected from the Cox’s Bazar Rohingya settlements.
Using membrane filtration technique, only 35 per cent of the samples were found negative for E Coli meeting the Bangladesh Standard and WHO guideline value (0 cfu/100ml), it said.
The remaining 65 per cent tested positive for faecal contamination and 38 per cent samples were very highly contaminated (>100 cfu/100ml).
Of the contaminated samples, 61 per cent were collected from water stored at household level, 18 per cent from tube-wells, 4 per cent from stream water (Chhara) and the remaining 11 per cent from other sources including water supplied by tankers.
UNICEF spokesperson Marixie Mercado on Friday said that despite a cholera vaccination campaign that exceeded its target of 650,000, the risk of diarrheal disease and dysentery remained exceptionally high.
Medical needs in the camps are extremely high, especially considering that many of the refugees would have walked long distances to reach Bangladesh, with many having experienced physical and sexual abuse along the way and are now living in over-crowded sites not prepared for inhabitation by more than 8,00,000 people, International Organisation for Migration said in a statement on Friday.
Source: New Age
