KARACHI, July 9: Failure of the civic agencies to ensure prompt disposal of garbage dumps and puddles may expose people to serious health hazards during the current monsoon season.

Doctors have warned parents to see ti it that their children do not bathe in standing pools of rain water as this causes fungal infections and painful skin diseases.

Poor hygienic conditions already contribute to skin diseases as scabies, impetigo and severe irritation. The situation, which tends to be all the more intense in monsoon, makes it necessary for civic agencies to see that cleanliness is maintained across the city.

Dr Mobina Agboatwala of the Civil Hospital has urged people to see that delay on part of the departments concerned does not expose them to any risk.

She says kerosene and insecticides should be immediately sprayed on rainwater standing in front of houses so that they can no longer be safe breeding grounds for mosquitoes, ticks and flies - carriers of malaria, scabies and cholera.

Many cost-effective ointments to treat skin infections are not available on the market as pharmaceuticals find them little profitable. So doctors are compelled to prescribe expensive options.

People have also been strictly advised to boil drinking water procured through taps for at least five to ten minutes.

Oral infections as gastroenteritis, cholera and typhoid are not only acquired through polluted water but also through contaminated food, says Dr Mobina.

She has advised people to avoid consuming food sold in open under poor hygienic conditions.

Typhoid, the doctors say, is caused through oral route and is often diagnosed late. High grade fever and abdominal pain are the symptoms of the ailment.

Dr Shiraz Hai, a child specialist, has advised parents to see that the antibiotic course is duly completed even if the body temperature of child declines to normal.

It is often due to improper compliance that children are found developing resistance to first and second generation of drugs for typhoid. The situation is also attributed to the deteriorating sanitary conditions in the city and poor hygienic practice on the part of people.

Quinolones and Ceftrioxone, which pertain to the third generation of antibiotics and are quite expensive, seem to be generally effective in controlling typhoid.

Dehydration, the severest outcome of the condition and massive body water loss, can be contained through intravenous fluids as well as Nimcol.—APP