Hundreds sick after drinking bad water

HUNDREDS of people living along the Highlands Highway in Southern Highlands’ Nipa are down with flu, typhoid and malaria.
The sicknesses were believed to have been caused by contaminated water and dust caused by trucks, travelling along the highway, day and night.
Many villagers complained about the dust in their houses which they had to prevent from falling on their eating utensils, beddings, clothes and drinking water.
Council president for Nipa Basin local level government David Navur told The National yesterday from Nipa that the long dry season and cold night frost also destroyed their vegetables and other food gardens.
He said the dust was caused by hundreds of trucks engaged in the liquefied natural gas project.
“School children, whose schools are located beside the road, are also affected with flu.
“The dust have fallen on classrooms and covered desks, tables, chairs, exercise books and other learning material.
“The road from Kiburu road junction to Tari then to Koroba/Kopiago was not sealed and gravel was used to upgrade the road for the big trucks to transport heavy machinery and goods into Hela’s LNG project sites,” he said.
Navur said it had not rained for four weeks and many creeks had dried up and people turned to the big rivers for their daily water needs.
He claimed that many people drank contaminated water and now had typhoid.
“It is difficult to confirm the exact number of people down with typhoid and malaria because they went out to seek medication.
“The people are having a difficult time getting medication because the Nipa health centre and 12 aid posts in the district, Marunk, Ingin, Powau, Poiya, Ungubi, Edena, Tumbi, Pulin, Puril, Hetinja, Mala and Nenura often run out of medicine.
“The aid posts are doing nothing because there are no medical drugs to treat patients,” he said, expressing grave concern that more people would get ill in the prolonged dry season.