Over 1,000 people have contracted bacterial diseases after drinking contaminated water in Iraq's southern Basra province hit by water shortages, a spokesperson for the Iraqi public health laboratory said on Monday.
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 20th August, 2018) Over 1,000 people have contracted bacterial diseases after drinking contaminated water in Iraq's southern Basra province hit by water shortages, a spokesperson for the Iraqi public health laboratory said on Monday.
According to media reports, Basra residents have been struggling with increasingly salty water in the region for years with the desalinization facilities failing to provide residents with enough drinkable water. The lack of fresh water also impacts electricity supplies in the region as high salinity levels prevent power plants from operating properly.
"The number of people who have contracted these bacteria exceeded 1,000 with most of them already treated," the spokesperson said as quoted by the Alsumaria tv channel.
He said that the bacterial disease cases had been registered in several districts of the Basra province adding that they were caused by contaminated water.
The water and electricity shortages ignited a wave of mass protests in Basra in early July, which later spread to other southern provinces with people demanding the government to put to address the issue and rallying against high unemployment rates as well.
In late July, media reported that authorities had established a special commission charged with meeting the protesters' demands and promised to allocate 3.5 trillion Dinar (almost $3 billion) to reconstruct the system of water and electricity supplies in Basra.
