In view of the ‘unknown disease’ in Badhal village of Rajouri, the village has been declared a containment zone, and the houses of the affected families have been sealed: Some patients were brought to the Government Medical College (GMC), Rajouri, on Thursday .
GMC Rajouri principal Amarjit Singh Bhatia assured of the government’s efforts to curb the rising deaths, citing no evidence of viral infection as health workers remain unaffected even after 1.5 months.
He said, “The steps we are taking, including containment, shifting people to medical colleges, show that our government, administration, legislators are making sincere efforts to stop the death rate from increasing. There is no evidence to say that it is a virus because the health care workers have been living there for 1.5 months, but no one has fallen ill. The evidence suggests that we do not need to be afraid, but since we have an invisible one. We are fighting the enemy, so we need to take all steps It’s not a quarantine, we’re just transferring patients to a different place.”
The Jammu and Kashmir government has started investigating these unexplained deaths with the help of health institutions across the country. Rapid response teams have been deployed and water sources have also been checked.
Meanwhile, on Wednesday, Union Minister Jitendra Singh also said that preliminary tests conducted by the Lucknow-based toxicology laboratory under CSIR have indicated the absence of any infection, virus or bacteria.
Earlier, Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah visited Badhal in Rajouri and assured citizens affected by the disease.
Chief Minister Abdullah told reporters, “The day we received the information, the health department along with other departments is engaged in understanding the reasons behind such incidents… Tests were conducted, and we came to the conclusion that these deaths No bacteria or virus was responsible.”
“Later we learned that all these deaths had occurred in three families,” he said. He said that the authorities are yet to know the reason behind these deaths.
CM Omar Abdullah said, “But, we are still to find out the reason behind the 17 deaths… Since it is not a disease, the police are also involved and have formed a team to investigate the matter. The central government team is also there and together we will investigate the incidents to find out the reasons behind all these deaths.”
Union Home Minister Amit Shah had also ordered the formation of an inter-ministerial team led by the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) to investigate the causes of unexplained deaths in the three incidents that occurred in the last six weeks.