THATTA, Dec 2: So far 46 people have succumbed to gastroenteritis and hundreds of others are still confined to bed since the outbreak of the epidemic three weeks back in the coastal areas of Thatta.

However, the provincial government as well as the Thatta district government seem to be totally indifferent to the miseries of the people of the coastal areas of Shah Bunder, Jati, Chuhar Jamali, Ladion, and village settlements.

An approximate data collected by a joint team of an NGO and newsmen confirmed that with the hospitalization of 35 patients at various hospitals and dispensaries of Sujawal Taluka, the number of gastroenteritis patients had reached 1,200.

Gul-e-Meena, daughter of Gul Mohammad Baloch, a resident of Bhains Colony, Karachi, was said to be the 46th victim of this disease at Shah Yaqiq, where she had arrived with her family.

Her mother, Salma Baloch, who had also caught the disease, was admitted to the rural health centre, Chuhar Jamali.

A woman, Aasi Singhar, was admitted to the Civil Hospital Makli.

The district Nazim, Thatta, Syed Shafqat Hussain Shah Shirazi, told newsmen that he had apprised the provincial secretary, health, about the situation but had received no response.

The provincial health department has done nothing to save precious lives with the sole exception of dispatching medicines worth Rs150,000 to the remote areas.

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