Diarrhea claims more lives
Diarrhea claims more lives
The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The aftermath of the recent catastrophic floods in the capital
has brought more pain to the victims, with four toddlers dying
from diarrhea. Many other victims, including babies, young people
and adults, are now threatened by disease following the
subsidence of the floodwaters.
The four infants died in the intensive care unit of Tarakan
Hospital in Central Jakarta. Two other babies had reportedly died
earlier in North Jakarta. One more infant died in Koja hospital,
North Jakarta, while another 15-day-old infant was in a critical
condition in the same hospital.
"Their parents brought them here too late. They died from
dehydration due to chronic diarrhea," Tarakan Hospital's
pediatric care unit deputy head Zuraida told The Jakarta Post on
Friday.
Zuraida said that most parents failed to take diarrhea
seriously.
"Most people bring their children to the hospital only if they
have a fever, a symptom that is not present with diarrhea," she
said, adding that a patient with diarrhea must receive treatment
immediately.
Tarakan Hospital had received a total of 170 patients with
diarrhea as of Friday. Ninety-five percent of the patients were
infants, mostly from the Grogol and Teluk Gong areas of West
Jakarta.
Due to limited capacity in the pediatric care unit, the
management had to lay out hundreds of additional mattress on the
hospital's three floors to accommodate all the patients.
Some toddlers are sleeping on mattresses in the corridors of
the hospital, while their parents or relatives lie on mats on the
floor.
The hospital is now very noisy all day long. Most of the
babies with intravenous feeding tubes on their arms spend much of
the day crying loudly.
"My daughter has been here for three days," said Kusriyati,
who was sitting on the floor next to her daughter Ayu's mattress.
Her rented house in Grogol was flooded last week. Her family
failed to save their belongings and had to take temporary shelter
under a toll road.
Kusriyati fed her seven-month-old daughter on packaged food as
there was no special baby foods available in the shelter.
"I know Ayu was suffering from diarrhea but I had no money to
go to the hospital. I'm grateful a doctor at the health post gave
a recommendation to enable me and my husband to rush Ayu to this
hospital," she said, adding that her husband was a scavenger.
The Cipto Mangunkusumo Hospital (RSCM) in Central Jakarta had
only admitted four victims as of Friday.
Head of the City Health Agency, Abdul Chalik Masulili, had
announced earlier that flood victims would receive free medical
treatment at any hospital in the city provided they had
references from one of the doctors on duty at 70 health posts in
263 shelters.
The agency also announced that around 18,000 of the 384,256
flood victims were suffering from diarrhea. So far, the agency
has not announced that the city is on a diarrhea alert, and has
yet to announce any efforts to prevent the diarrhea from becoming
an epidemic.