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LAYYAH, Aug 31: Eighty-five people, including 25 children, suffering from gastroenteritis were admitted to the Chowk Azam Rural Health Centre (RHC) and District Headquarters Hospital here on Friday night.
They were hospitalised because of stomach pain after they ate food at a wedding ceremony at Chak 407, 28 kilometers from Layyah. They were shifted to the Chowk Azam and Fatehpur RHCs and the Layyah DHQ hospital.
Water, patients’ stools and blood samples were sent to Lahore for bacteriology lab testing. The results cinformed cholera germs in the blood of so many patients.
Health District Officer Khalid Naeem said that seven hand pumps in the area had been sealed for supplying contaminated water. People of the area were provided necessary health education and water purification tablets. He confirmed that cholera germs were also found in the blood of a few patients.
SEALED: The district administration has taken the control of six flour mills and officials of the food, revenue and police departments have been deployed on the mills premises.
The administration took the initiative on the orders of the Punjab government after these mills refused to supply flour on governmental rates. The mills which were taken over by the district administration include Al-Madni, Chand Khan, Rustam Rehman, Ahmed Khan, Mubashir Abdullah and Faraan flour mills.
Seth Muhammad Aslam, owner of Chand Khan flour mill, said flour mills could not supply a 20kg flour bag on government’s rate of Rs300 per bag. He said if the government supplied wheat for Rs480 per 40 kg, mills would supply flour on the government rates.
