World News | WHO concerned about surge in disease caused by floods in Pakistan

ISLAMABAD, Sept. 18 (PTI) The World Health Organization has expressed fears that a second waterborne disease disaster is imminent in Pakistan after devastating floods in several parts of the country.

In a statement issued by WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the global health watchdog said disruptions to water supplies in flood-hit areas in Pakistan are forcing people to drink unsafe water, which can lead to cholera and other diseases.

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The WHO has warned people in flood-hit Pakistan, the worst-hit province of Sindh, to be extra careful.

Tedros stressed Saturday that stagnant water is a breeding ground for mosquitoes that transmit vector-borne diseases such as malaria and dengue fever, and urged donors to continue to respond generously to “save lives and prevent more suffering.”

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Separately, the WHO director-general tweeted that he was “deeply concerned about the potential for a second disaster in Pakistan, the spread of disease and the potential for life-threatening post-flooding” and asked for swift support to address the issue.

“If we act quickly to protect the health system and provide essential services, we can reduce the impact of this looming health crisis,” he tweeted.

The situation in Pakistan continues to be dire as devastating floods wreaked havoc on the country, especially in Balochistan and Sindh.

Floods across Pakistan have killed at least 1,545 people and affected an estimated 16 million children.

WHO immediately allocated $10 million from the WHO Emergency Response Fund to enable global health agencies to deliver essential medicines and other supplies to the country.

Meanwhile, the Sindh health department said that since July 1, a total of 2.5 million patients have been treated in different medical camps across the province, Dawn reported.

As many as 594,241 patients were treated for skin-related diseases, followed by diarrhoea (534,800), malaria (10,702), dengue fever (1,401) and other diseases (120,745,1), according to a report by the General Directorate of Integrated Health Services in Sindh. .

The report also showed that a total of 90,398 patients were treated in the past 24 hours, including 17,919 for diarrhea, 19,746 for skin-related diseases, 695 for malaria and 388 for dengue fever.

About 92,797 people were treated in the province on September 15, the newspaper reported.

In Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, the health department said its officials were already working to stop the spread of dengue haemorrhagic fever in flood-affected areas of the province, Tribune Express reported.

(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from the Syndicated News feed, the body of the content may not have been modified or edited by LatestLY staff)