Sep 6, 2008, 7:43 GMT
New Delhi - At least 32 people, including 18 children, have died from diarrhoea in India's flood-hit eastern Bihar state, raising fears of the outbreak of an epidemic, news reports said Friday.
Most of the victims contracted disease by drinking contaminated water, IANS news agency reported quoting unnamed official sources.
Towns and villages across large swathes of Bihar have been flooded for more than a fortnight since the Kosi River breached its banks in neighboring Nepal following heavy monsoon rains.
Thousands are still marooned and hundreds of villages remain under at least two feet of water. Millions of people have been displaced by the floods, and at least 80 people have died, according to government estimates.
The dehydration deaths fro diarrhoea were reported from the Supaul, Saharsa and Araria districts.
The head of Manganj village in Supaul district said 17 people, who had taken shelter on the rooftop of a school, died of the disease.
Officials said more than 100 cases of diarrhoea and dysentery had been reported from flood-hit areas. Most of the patients complained of vomiting and stomach ache.
'Lack of access to clean drinking water is a major cause of the spread of diarrhoea as people are forced to consume water from contaminated sources for survival,' an official of Bihar's disaster management department was quoted as saying.
India's federal Health Ministry said Friday it was sending 300 tons of medicines to Bihar including water disinfectants, measles' vaccines and malaria-testing kits.
Meanwhile, the Metereological Department warned of heavy rains over the next 48 hours in eastern and north-eastern India, which may worsen the situation in north-eastern Assam state, where Bramhaputra River and its tributaries have flooded large areas.
The death toll in the current floods in Assam stands at 17 and about 1.5 million people have been affected.
According to official data, 1,866 people have died this year in 15 of India's 29 states are in flood brought on by the annual monsoon rains that last from June to end-September.
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