SUKKUR, Jan 30: At least 13 persons, 12 of them children, have died in the Qaim Kalhoro village, Obaro taluka, Ghotki district, during the past 15 days after being afflicted by a disease, which the local doctors have been unable to diagnose.

According to local people, 12 of the children had died during the past two days.

The symptoms of the disease, the villagers said, were that the patients would shiver and feel cold, followed by suspension of urine and ache in the legs after which the patient would collapse and succumb to the extreme conditions of the disease.

A man, Hashim, who had to face the agony of two deaths in his family, demanded of the government to send a team of expert doctors to identify the disease.

Another man, Mohammad Ramazan, said that during elections, various candidates used to visit and ask the local people to cast their votes in their favour, but in the face of this calamity no one was available.

The doctors, he added, were not available in hospitals.

The medical superintendent of the Obaro Hospital, Abdul Ghafoor Dahar, said that a team of medical experts had visited the area but had failed to diagnose the disease.

However, he confirmed the spread of measles, which had hit a large number of people, adding that one or two cases of hepatitis-B had also been reported.

According to him, the cause of the deaths was that the victims were brought to hospitals when there was no hope for the patients to survive, and, on top of that, the doctors were not available in the hospitals.

Dr Dahar said that a large stock of anti-measles vaccine have been sent to the local hospitals and a team of doctors was also dispatched in the affected village to carry out vaccination.