KARACHI, May 31: Laboratory tests, carried out on samples taken in nine districts of Sindh, have indicated the presence of arsenic.

In six of the districts, the concentration of arsenic was unacceptably high, leading to the possibility of increased prevalence of arsenicosis and other diseases among the population.

This was stated on Monday by Mohammad Saleem Khan and Dr Sikander Panhwer of the Sindh Local Government Department, Rana Syed of Unicef Pakistan and Naseem-ur-Rehman of Unicef Bangladesh, during a press briefing.

The newsmen were informed that in 2001 water samples taken in Thatta, Dadu, Badin, Shikarpur, Ghotki, Tharparkar, Khairpur, Nawabshah and Naushero Feroz districts were tested for harmful chemicals by the Pakistan Council of Research in Water Resources, Pakistan Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, Local Government and Rural Development and the Public Health Engineering Department, in collaboration with the Unicef.

In all the districts, the concentration of arsenic was found to be above the WHO guideline of 10 parts per billion (ppb). And in six of the districts, the concentration was discovered to be above the internationally accepted guideline of 50ppb. The districts where the problem was most severe were Khairpur and Dadu.

Dr Sikander Panhwer of the Local Government Department said the regular use of water laced with arsenic over a long period of time can cause an unacceptably high concentration in the human body, leading to the onset of various diseases, including skin rashes, cardio-vascular ailments and even cancer.

Rana Syed of Unicef Pakistan said the issue should be taken seriously. She said that there was a need for creating an awareness among people about ways and means to mitigate the same.

On this issue, Dr Panhwer said the moment it was found that a particular source of water was contaminated with arsenic, the use of water coming out of it should be discontinued. The diseases caused by the overuse of arsenic-contaminated water were fortunately reversible.

Sinking tubewells that were 200 to 500feet in depth was another option. Dr Panhwer added that boiling of water, instead of resolving the problem, worsens it as concentration of arsenic in water actually increases as a consequence.

Mohammad Saleem Khan of the Local Government Department claimed that the problem of arsenic contamination in water supplied to the population of Karachi was not too great. He, however, admitted that some hydrants in the city were supplying contaminated water.

Mr Khan added that water from River Indus was safe for human consumption. Answering a question, he said the authorities were alive to the situation and doing their best to contain and mitigate the problem.

Naseem-ur-Rehman of Unicef Bangladesh said the problem of arsenic contamination was a particularly difficult one to handle because there was no pattern to it. "We have seen that even in a village there can be some tubewells which give safe water and others that give contaminated water," he remarked.

More than 25 per cent of the six to 10 million tubewells in Bangladesh gave arsenic-contaminated water. The Unicef was blamed for the problem because it advocated the installation of tubewells in Bangladesh. However, while the Unicef took care in sinking tubewells of the right depth, many communities did not, leading to various problems.