arsenic poisoning in Bangladesh/India

1. Coordinated Action Imperative

One can hardly fault cynics for dismissing all the talking shops-seminars and conferences-on the arsenic disaster in Bangladesh, considered to be the worst case of mass poisoning in the world, worse than even Chernobyl's radioactive legacy in the Ukraine. At least three such high profile events have been organised in the past few days with the Prime Minister and the President expressing the government's intentions to address the problem. And we would hope this time round the cynics would be proved wrong.

It needs no telling that everybody moving in the donor-development circuit seems to have been jumping on the arsenic bandwagon ever since the problem surfaced but precious little have resulted as far as mitigation is concerned. This paper has been hammering for serious coordinated action between the government and 'development partners', to help the vulnerable areas revert to alternative sources of reasonably safe water and to attend to the health needs of the already affected people. But so far we have seen only a proliferation of NGOs, assorted consultants, bottled water and filter sellers and what not, catching larks, so to say, while the poisoning continues.

Governments (we have had three, including the present, since arsenic in tubewells became known) and the donors and development agencies have wasted nearly a decade, first trying to trivialise it, then suppressing the fact and lately waking up, albeit slowly. But we are still far from a well-thought-out national policy that can address all the aspects of the tragedy.

It is imperative that we stop dithering and start addressing the problem with the urgency and seriousness it deserves. Rather than leave it to the local government, one suggestion is that a high-powered inter-ministerial body be formed which would be intellectually equipped enough to take appropriate decisions and actions.

It is reassuring to find that at long last experts are saying favourable things about our rains, rivers and ponds despite the bad name they earned as sources of water-borne diseases, the main reason why tube well contractors-local and foreign, individual and agencies-could do brisk business in Bangladesh and become tycoons in no time. Hundreds of thousands of tube wells were sunk to tap underground aquifers disregarding the knowledge that over-extraction of these sources could have adverse ecological consequences, gradually drying up the aquifers and leading to surface aridity, apart from the current leaching of excessive arsenic in the water.

There is no reason why we cannot revert to our bountiful of fresh water reserves, taking care that indiscriminate runoff from farms and factories is prohibited at individual and community level. Ordinary people need only a little facilitation from the government or other agencies to take care of their own safe water needs, provided dedicated money-makers do not mislead them again.

With simple and affordable surface and rainwater collection, storage and decontamination methods popularised, we could start undoing some of the harm that poisoned tubewells have wrought for Bangladesh's people, provided the political will is there.

Source: Editorial, The Bangladesh Observer 16. 01. 02.

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2. Arsenic poisoning: We are at risk
by Quamrul Islam Chowdhury

By drilling hundreds of thousands of tube-wells -- both for irrigation and safe drinking water in the villages -- the authorities and planners unwittingly exposed millions of the rural Bangladeshis to the naturally occurring poisons in the groundwater. Now there is no time to waste for the planners and decision-makers. They must act and act decisively to save millions of people from slow mass poisoning by deadly arsenic.

Pinjira has lost her battle with arsenic. Sofura is missing. Zahangir is knocked down. Kamal Hossain's dream has been shattered. The sordid tales of thousands of innocent victims of mass poisoning of arsenic contamination have been hitting the headlines of national and international media for last couple of years. The problem of arsenic pollution in Bangladesh's ground water has turned into a crisis of unprecedented proportion. Millions of people in rural Bangladesh have been exposed to the risk. At the end of the year 2001, the claws of arsenic have also threatened thousands of people of 28 municipalities. The new government of Prime Minister Begum Khaleda Zia has already declared arsenic problem as one of its 100-day agenda for action.

In early 1996, arsenic contamination of groundwater was reported first in Bagerhat, Satkhira and Kushtia, three south-western Bangladesh districts bordering the Indian state of West Bengal. Some 61 out of 64 districts across the country (FEJB, 2000) face the menace of arsenic poisoning. LGRD Minister Abdul Mannan Bhuiyan and Health Minister Dr. Khondker Mosharraf Hossain informed that the number of arsenic patients crossed the 10,000-mark. Against this backdrop, an international arsenic week begins in Dhaka from this Friday. Three back-to-back international conferences and workshops will be held in the city this week. The World Water Forum of Journalists (WWFJ) is organising a two-day international conference on Arsenic contamination on groundwater: Media strategy from January 11. Dhaka Community Hospital is holding an international workshop from January 12. The LGRD Ministry is organising an international workshop from January 14. All to address the grave arsenic problem.

At the end of 2001, Bangladeshi officials admitted that some 80 million people -- more than 65 per cent of the country's population -- live in the arsenic-contaminated areas. Due to the sheer magnitude of the catastrophe, a resource-poor nation like Bangladesh is now struggling, not quite successfully, to cope with the problem caused by arsenic-contaminated tube-wells in the rural areas. Of late, there have been some efforts to mitigate the woes of the arsenic-hit villagers through distribution of water filtration devices. The authorities have also been reportedly seeking an easy solution to tackle this latest environmental hazard.

The authorities are ill equipped both financially and technically to deal with the massive problem. They have been at a loss how to deal with its fallout. The government launched a campaign to create awareness among the public about the hazards of drinking arsenic-contaminated water and issued warnings through radio and television. A National Arsenic Committee was formed to address the problem. But efforts to tackle the situation have to be far more widespread and intense. Most of rural Bangladesh has been caught up in an arsenic panic. Members of the Forum of Environmental Journalists of Bangladesh (FEJB) were the first to break the bad news. Now FEJB is trying to sensitise the officials and policy makers about the magnitude of the disaster. They have also been trying their level best to make the people, particularly the rural community, aware of the hazard and also of the ways to mitigate public suffering caused by the arsenic-contaminated groundwater.

Arsenic is a white, semi-metallic powder found in nature. Some of its compounds -- arsenite and arsenate -- are highly toxic and can cause skin cancer, kidney and liver failure, respiratory problems, and in extreme cases, death. Other symptoms include dark brown spots on the body, thickening of the skin of the palms and feet, and warts on hands and legs. Colourless, tasteless and naturally occurring in the sub-soils, arsenic has been seeping into the region's groundwater for years. Some experts say that arsenic beneath Bangladesh's fertile delta was probably deposited long ago after being washed down from the ores in the Himalayas. For long, the arsenic compounds called arsenic sulphides were submerged in groundwater and remained inert. But with the advent of intensive irrigation in the 1960s, the aquifers started to drop, exposing the poisons to oxygen for the first time. Once oxidised, arsenic sulphides become water-soluble. They percolate from the sub-soils into the water tables during every monsoon flood.

Late Amjad Hussain Khan, a Bangladeshi water expert, reportedly observed in 1997 that the arsenic contamination had originated in the Indian state of West Bengal bordering Bangladesh -- particularly on the eastern side of the Ganges-Bhagirathi rivers. The deadly poison then slowly seeped into Bangladesh's groundwater. He said that the western border districts, specially the south-western region of Bangladesh, were particularly vulnerable to arsenic contamination. The reason is that the sediments on both sides of the border have the same depositional history and geological environment -- the region being commonly known as the Ganges delta. Khan said that the aquifer of the contaminated zones in West Bengal and that of the areas within Bangladesh were hydrologically connected. He further observed that the groundwater of the region along the south-western border belt of Bangladesh is highly vulnerable to arsenic contamination.

The first reports of arsenic contamination of water appeared in 1978 in West Bengal. The initial theories blamed arsenic pollution on the use of insecticides and pesticides, metal strainers of industrial effluents, etc. But, subsequent studies proved such theories to be wrong. The School of Environmental Studies [SOES], Jadavpur University, near Kolkata, the capital of West Bengal, started investigation in 1988 when reports of sporadic cases of arsenic poisoning began to appear in West Bengal. The study said that for centuries a 450-kilometre stretch of arsenic has been deposited in rich silt clay some 70 to 200 feet below the surface in an area covering about 35,000 square kilometres. The problem did not surface until the 1970s when the farmers in West Bengal began tapping huge amounts of groundwater to irrigate their summer crops, thus triggering chemical changes in the soil composition.

Scientists now advise that if a catastrophe is to be averted, pumping of groundwater must be reduced and farmers should increasingly try to tap surface water for irrigation. As the water table falls, pyrites -- a mineral which holds arsenic -- begins to oxidise and exude the poison, contaminating thousands of shallow tube-wells.

In June 2000, the Dhaka-based National Institute of Preventive and Social Medicine (NIPSOM) tested some 1000 samples of tube-well water in 17 rural districts. And it found arsenic in at least 180 such samples. Arsenic toxicity in the water of the affected districts is 25 to 35 times higher the safety level set by the World Health Organisation (WHO). The permissible level of arsenic in water is 0.05 ppm, according to experts. The Bangladesh Atomic Energy Commission found the level of arsenic between 1.5 and 2 ppm in tube-well water in the districts bordering West Bengal. The situation was so bad that an even more dangerous level of arsenic toxicity was found in the water of a tube-well in the village home of the then incumbent Health Minister, the late Salauddin Yusuf, in Khulna, which is not far from the border with India. During 2001, the number of arsenic poisoned tube-wells was on the rise, creating a panic across the country.

Tests of water samples collected from the arsenic-infected areas of the country contained more than the normal percentage of arsenic. Twenty-eight per cent of the affected people had more than 100 to 1500 per cent more arsenic than the normal level in their urine, 47 per cent had 8 to 20 per cent more than the normal level in their nails and 98 per cent had 100 to 15,000 per cent more than the normal level in their skin! Twenty per cent of the water samples contained amounts of arsenic, 100 to 900 per cent more than the allowable quantity. The DCH tested 920 patients suffering from skin diseases, of whom 150 were suspected to have been suffering from arsenic poisoning. Samples of urine, nails, hair and skin were collected from 95 of some 105 patients.

Thousands of people of 28 municipalities of the country are drinking arsenic contaminated water from pipeline water supply system, a recent study has revealed. Earlier, it was believed that the wells including the deep tube-wells in the municipalities posed no threat to public health since they were safe. The tests were carried out by the Dhaka Community Hospital (DCH) in cooperation with The Daily Star between January and September 2001. The municipalities include the hill district of Rangamati where, until now, experts ruled out possibilities of finding arsenic even at low concentration. Laboratory tests of water samples collected from the municipalities revealed that all of them including those from privately owned wells contained at least 0.03 milligram per litre arsenic or three times the acceptable level (0.01 mg/L) for human consumption. For Bangladesh, the highest level of arsenic in drinking water is 0.05mg/L.

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), long-term consumption of arsenic can cause various skin diseases. Experts studying some arsenic patients have concluded that long-term exposure to arsenic through drinking can lead to cancer in the bladder, intestine and even lungs. So far, official surveys in only 500 villages have found over 10,000 arsenic patients suffering from various forms of ailments including cancer related to arsenic poisoning.

The DCH study found the highest concentration of 0.199 mg/L arsenic in a deep tube-well in Gopalganj town that supplies water to more than 12,000 inhabitants. The second highest concentration was found in another Gopalganj town deep tube-well supplying water to more than 10,000 people. This one has an arsenic concentration of 0.177 mg/L. In Chuadanga town, a 170-feet deep tube-well, which is shared by some 20 families, has a concentration of 0.42 mg/L of arsenic. The users have been drinking from the well for the last six years.

In Kishoreganj and Laxmipur district towns, similar concentrations of arsenic were detected. In Kishoreganj, a privately owned well had presence of arsenic at 0.183 mg/L while in Laxmipur 0.267 and 0.140 mg/L arsenic was found.

Similarly, high concentration of arsenic was detected in Magura, Manikganj, Narail and Kushtia district towns. A total of eight teams collected water samples and other data. People at risk from drinking arsenic at high concentration were informed in writing. The Department of Public Health and Engineering (DPHE) was also informed about the status of arsenic concentration.

However, according to sources, none of the deep tube-wells with high concentration of arsenic have so far been shut down. The urban areas from where water samples were collected are Barisal, Brahmanbaria, Chapainawabganj, Chittagong, Chuadanga, Cox's Bazar, Dhaka, Dinajpur, Habiganj, Jessore, Jhenidah, Khulna, Kishoreganj, Kushtia, Laxmipur, Magura, Manikganj, Moulvibazar, Munshiganj, Narail, Natore, Pabna, Rajshahi, Rangamati, Rangpur and Sylhet. When contacted, Chief Engineer of the DPHE Abu Muslim said, "We have tested water in almost all the 100 municipalities and found eight of them to have contaminated water." "Alternative measures like iron-arsenic removal plats (IARP) have been installed to remove arsenic and in some places we have also shut down pumps. As soon as we learnt about contamination, we ordered for alternative measures," Muslim added.

The eight districts where the DPHE has taken alternative measures to remove arsenic are Rajshahi, Chapainawabganj, Chuadanga, Satkhira, Meherpur, Faridpur, Noakhali and Gopalganj. Meantime, Gopalganj Pourashava (municipality) Chairman Mohmmad Ali Khan expressed surprise when told about the concentration levels of arsenic in his town. "I am really surprised. We must take immediate measures to inform the people about the risks," Khan reacted. Until recently, government and non-government agencies have tested water in rural areas. So far, 61 of 64 districts are found affected by arsenic. According to the latest data, 85 million people in the affected areas are at risk of drinking arsenic contaminated water. LGRD Minister Abdul Mannan Bhuiyan said a preliminary survey to identify arsenic-affected patients was conducted in different rural districts of Bangladesh. He said instructions had been given to the Department of Public Health and Engineering to supply arsenic-free water to the affected areas. Besides, he said, instructions had been given to test the tube-well water locally in every district. He suggested that grassroots level people should be involved in arsenic mitigation programmes.

Stressing the need for undertaking preventive measures against arsenic toxicity, Dr. A.Z.M. Iftikhar Hossain, deputy programme manager of the Arsenic Mitigation Project, said his department had already developed a filter to purify arsenic-contaminated water. There is no definite cure for arsenic poisoning, but uncontaminated water and nutritious food over a period of time nurture sufferers back to health. Unfortunately, there are few alternative water supplies in the affected districts and most of the people in the rural areas cannot afford nutritious food.

As the mysterious sores first appeared on the work-toughened palms of Anil Chandra Das, a rice farmer in the southwestern Nowapara area, he kept grizzling in pain but just ignored it. But the lesions did not go away. Instead, the small purplish scabs on his palms began cracking and bleeding. Then the headaches started, accompanied by chest congestion and stomach cramps. And finally, in March, 1997 the man whose neighbours remember him for his breezy story-telling died.

With 61 out of 64 districts affected and 264 upazilas being the most affected, it is believed that at least 26 million people are at risk of contacting arsenicosis. Because, the people themselves with the help of private sector installed most of the tube-wells and so there are no records of how many wells exit. The estimate is between 6-10 million. If the current national pace of testing output cannot be improved, it will take 6-8 years just to test all of the existing tube-wells, observed an expert.

There is no pattern to arsenic contamination of groundwater. One well in a village may be safe while another well 100 yards away may be contaminated over the current nationally prescribed safe level of 50ppb. And the one after that may again be safe! Therefore, the only way to know if a tube-well is providing safe water or not is to test every tube-well. The contamination of tube-wells may change over time and so, people will at some point need to have access to local testing facilities so that they can regularly check the level of contamination in their wells. This facility presently does not exist.

There is still no clear medical understanding as to why some members of a family contact arsenicosis while others do not, even though they drink the same water. At what time and in what circumstances will people contact arsenicosis? What is the risk factor related to the onset of gangrene and cancer? There are no clear answers to these issues till date. There is a growing possibility that arsenic may be entering the food chain through contaminated irrigation water. This may have an effect not only on the food being eaten (which may eventually have adverse impact on the economy of the farming community), but also on the ability of the soil to produce crops.

While arsenicosis is not a contagious disease, it often appears to be to the affected rural communities. There are instances where affected children, having the raindrop pattern, kurtosis and melanomas symptoms on their skin, are being asked to leave school. Parents are deserting their families. Marriage prospects for the affected youth may be severely hampered. In the advanced stages, people may suffer amputation as a result of gangrene or cancer, severely affecting the chances of earning or sustaining a livelihood. If at some point, soil is found to be contaminated and food production becomes unmarketable, it would have far reaching implications in the socio-economic sector and national development. There is really no time to lose. This problem calls for a two-pronged approach; an emergency testing and awareness creation in the first place, followed by a second stage of a community based and sustainable set of activities.

The Department of Public Health Engineering (DPHE),and NGOs are working to develop and implement a four-part community-based and integrated arsenic mitigation programme. It is widely believed that action should be carried out on an emergency basis to undertake countrywide testing. The urgent need to test all tube-wells has to be addressed as quickly as possible.

The issue of sustainability must be addressed. Testing facilities must eventually be made available to the people on a continual and cost-effective basis through public and private sector partnerships. The government has an overarching responsibility to put in place regular and systematic groundwater quality monitoring for a wide range of parameters to ensure that knowledge base is increased and that the population is kept fully informed. Field test kits are improving. Arsenicosis patients can be looked for either by house-to- house search or through health camps. The next and perhaps greatest challenge yet is to help people to obtain safe water supply in a sustainable way in the long term, because arsenic contamination is not going to go away in the foreseeable future. While there may be more new technologies that have not yet been learned of, there are already enough reliable options available to move quickly to assist people in their quest for safe water supply. Rainwater harvesting is a household option that costs approximately Taka 5,000 for 3,000 litres. It is not new; it has been used for thousands of years. The issue is whether or how well people are able to conserve the stored water during the dry season.

Pond sand filtration is a community option, costing approximately Taka 42,000. Again not a new technology, it has been used to clean up surface water for many years, especially in the saline affected areas of the country. The issue is that the community has to agree to carry out regular maintenance. Another community option is the protected dug well costing approximately Taka 12,000. These wells tap water from above the arsenic contaminated zone and are a good option where the water table is high enough.

In addition to these traditional and well-known systems, UNICEF /DPHE are trying out other filtration systems, which employ a column filter filled with a media which adsorbs arsenic. Some of these systems can deliver or treat up to 500,000 litres of contaminated water on one filter pack, lasting up to 500 days before the filter media needs to be replaced. These are also effective at removing iron from the raw water and therefore, are even more popular with the community. The capital cost for this type of filter may at first seem prohibitive. However, simple mathematics show that the cost per treated litre is, in fact, very small -- approximately only Taka 0.4 per litre as calculated against the initial capital cost. The cost per litre for the second filter is much, much less when calculated against only the cost of the replacement filter.

In addition, the government is working with its partners to assist in developing a locally produced adsorbent media, which will be ideal for household filtration. So far, this locally produced media seems to hold good prospects and will be a cheaper option for household use. The aim is to reach a stage where affected communities can be informed about a range of options which might be feasible for each given situation; where the community will then decide which is the option they want to choose.

Many people in the past had warned the proponents of the Green Revolution about the dangers of over-extraction of groundwater for irrigation. But the policy-makers in the 1960s did not heed to such warnings. By drilling hundreds of thousands of tube-wells -- both for irrigation and safe drinking water in the villages -- the authorities and planners unwittingly exposed millions of the rural Bangladeshis to the naturally occurring poisons in the groundwater. Now there is no time to waste for the planners and decision-makers. They must act and act decisively to save millions of people from slow mass poisoning by deadly arsenic.

Now, the question that may arise is how to go about in tackling the problem. Here are some ways:

Emergency measures

Raising public awareness should be the starting point for any approach to deal with the arsenic problem

Groundwater treatment technologies that are cheap, efficient and easy to use should be applied at a large scale as an interim or midterm solution Immediate measures must be taken to protect the health of those living in areas where water is contaminated by arsenic

Improving nutrition and fighting under-nourishment has to be a central element of the fight against the arsenic crisis

Participation of the civil society has to be a key element of designing, planning and implementing remedial strategies

Intra-governmental coordination is a must for effective implementation.

Information dissemination and transparency play a key role in effectiveness of remedial strategies while building the confidence of stakeholders, particularly general public.

Long-term policy alternatives

An overall health policy to deal with currently-identified patients as well as those potentially at risk

Food security and improving nutritional quality of the food should be a high priority
Alternative livelihoods should be provided for those who are directly impacted by arsenic contamination as well as their immediate families

Water resource management on a regional or national scale is essential to fully exploit the abundant water resources available in Bangladesh

Scientific research has to be emphasised to reduce uncertainty, with due consideration to local conditions

Drinking water standard has to be re-evaluated based on scientific research, and
Coordination, management and dissemination of information should be undertaken through well-defined mechanisms.

Quamrul Islam Chowdhury is chairman-elect of APFEJ, chairman of FEJB and secretary-general of WWFJ.

Source: The Daily Star , 10. 01. 02

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3.Arsenic: How some gained, and others lost

by Afsan Chowdhury

In l995, it was in the air that something horrible had happened to the tubewell supplied drinking water system. There were rumours but that's all. By l996, it began to look like a crisis. The organization that took a lead in this was called Disaster Forum (DF). It was supported by OXFAM of the UK and led by Gowher Nayeem Wahra. He had been looking for evidence to link the rumours with the facts for sometime. On behalf of DF, he commissioned Dhaka Community Hospital to run a health camp in Pabna. Patients with strange ailments began to be noted there. It soon transpired that these were victims of arsenicosis. Till then the government had maintained a face of near total denial. They never even informed the people drinking arsenic contaminated tubewell water about the danger. This was a criminal omission. But this was done. It was a conspiracy of self protection created over many years of practice by those who knew. The secret became public.

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THE NIPSOM doctor was explaining the history of the crisis. He was uncomfortable because the evidence that a cover up had happened was obvious. UNICEF was supporting its feeble efforts to do practically nothing.

"The first arsenic carrying tubewells were detected in l993 in Chapainawabganj. We sealed them and prepared a project for the government. But the project was never approved. We have got some money from Unicef to do some work but no programme exists." "But why didn't you inform the people. Don't they have a right to know? " "We thought it was a local problem. We didn't want to cause panic." Then he stopped. A government officer doesn't know the idea of public rights. He had no answer about rights.

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WHAT became obvious was the extreme contempt in which the official technocrats and bureaucrats held ordinary people. The entire idea of development in Bangladesh is based on the GO-NGO co-operation model and the people have little role to play in this. NGOs are generically fund seekers and now provider of employment. Most of them have almost no reality beyond this. And this generally grovelling bunch conveniently represents the public face in the eyes of the donors who ultimately decide policies. Not because they want to but because they have to. The ability of the national counterparts is so low that they would not be able to formulate a policy without donor support. They are unable to disagree either because that might mean fund cuts. So it all ends up in the same basket.

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WHEN the arsenic crisis finally hit the national media, there was some action and of course the World Bank came in. That means an appraisal mission and all that. As DF was part of the scene at that time, they came to see DF fellows amongst others. I remember the members of the British Geological Society (BGS), a very smug lot. "It's a very bad scene. Nobody here knows what is going on. We have got the facts". One of them looked happy in saying. Nobody had detected it before them.

I have recently learnt that BGS have been sued in a British court for failing to carry out tests including on arsenic when under contract to DFID and working in Bangladesh. These are the people whom we hand over our fate and wait to be taken care of.

The World Bank team was smarter, more sophisticated and certainly more duplicitous. They promised to brief everyone about their findings and of course never did. The World Bank has years of experience in "facts management" -- though some call it -- and of course did that. The report was given only to the Government's Directorate of Public Health Engineering (DPHE), those responsible for digging tubewells and feeling a bit of the heat then.

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SUDDENLY the number of NGOs and foreign experts began to increase dramatically. The Japanese took over a village and started their own experiments. They came to see us and were a bit surprised that we didn't welcome them as others did. At the DF office, Nayeem Wahra said, " In our language, there is a proverb. A poor man's wife is everyone's sister-in-law. Would you allow us to go to any Japanese village and do such experiments?" They had no answer. They never thought that in servile Bangladesh, citizens of donor countries are even asked questions. We were considered so impudent that no discussion was possible. They hurriedly left not sure that this was a proper welcome for the Japanese, Bangladesh's largest donor.

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THE government never took the matter seriously but they were always concerned that the crisis never became a political embarrassment. Because the BNP government had rejected arsenic mitigation proposal in 1993, and never taken the problem seriously, the then AL government was willing to criticize the past. Minister Matia Chowdhury spoke about use of surface water but Matia Chowdhury's goodwill was overwhelmed by the technocrats and the donors. The World Bank in consultation with a selected few outfits and individuals made the plan and then placed it and it was accepted by the senior bureaucracy. I remember all the promises made about "participation and consultation" but I suppose that's the only way the World Bank can operate. Their best friend in keeping secrets away from the people is always the government. When a committee was formed by the then Health Secretary -- a donor friendly Secretary who later also steered the Health and Population Sector Programme (HPSP) -- the DF found that they had attended the meet to form the group but had been left out. It's at this point that the caucus took over in which records would show that the informal "arsenic beneficiary group" was born. I will not independently name them but they can be traced through their collaborative links to the Government and the World Bank. In fact, the WB had even given a room to the NIPSOM experts to write the programme which was duly welcomed. After all the accommodations at Paribagh are much better than that at Mahakhali.

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I have nothing against the Bank. This is what they do. They have served their historical purpose and are on the wane as WTO swings up. They are now the most radical sounding outfit in town. There is so much evidence of their global failure that nobody talks much about it anymore. We do because we are so much behind the world and we still suck up to them. Plus, this is where senior bureaucrats go for their cushy jobs. The WB functions best in countries like ours because we have no performance audits, no accountability, extreme crony corruption and, to be honest, inadequate mental faculties to challenge them. Those who have chase them for assignments. And so everyone has a stake in the World Bank. What irritates is their pontification. It's plain bad taste. But then who will hand out consultancies to keep our brains well fed if they don't?

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WITHIN a year our NGOs, the private sector arm of the government had enough plans and projects to get the sector up and running. I remember reading in a World Bank document that $l50 million could lead to a sustainable solution for the problem. Ultimately, they came up with 50-60 million dollars plus another few million dollars to be raised from the consumers. The NGOs were called SOB -- Support Organizations of Bangladesh -- though I understand that SOB also means something else. I wonder if this was a Macnamarasque slip or not?

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THE last government spent more than $ l50 million buying MIG jets and a frigate to protect our national security and the borders. At a protest meeting held at the Press Club we compared the crises. India versus arsenic, India versus global warming, environmental versus military treat. People have made fun of our position when we say that the environmental security is a serious one, certainly bigger than the border issue. But face the fact, who would be insane enough to grab us?

So when the crisis gets even worse, I hope the MIG planes will attack the arsenic sources to oblivion, the frigates will threaten away the waves of the rising water level from our shores and the army jawans will bayonet all the tubewells to death. That will be a security activity everyone will cheer. In fact, more may be spent to protect the Indian border from us by India than our entire national budget.

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I once attended a meeting at UNICEF. When I mentioned the need to look at all water sources including surface water use and mentioned that we had successfully carried out experiments to show that, a lady who represented the British NGO Water Aid sniggered and said, " I don't understand the local people. At the first excuse they want to jump back to the pond." There was approving laughter all around. It has remained for me the defining description of our problem.

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I am not with the Disaster Forum, which was an outfit of volunteers. But the problem has remained. But that experience has taught me that development without accountability is a lie. And we live by that.

Afsan Chowdhury is Senior Assistant Editor of The Daily Star.

Source: The Daily Star 15. 01. 02

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4.Facing arsenic disaster -Too much time has already been wasted

Editorial

If organising and attending conferences is any indication of the seriousness of this government in facing the arsenic disaster then we are into happy times. In the last few days no less than three international conferences have been held in the city, the last two being addressed by the President and the Prime Minister. There could not be a firmer public expression of political will by a government than this. Now the challenge is to turn this official commitment into, to quote the President, "widespread and affordable action".

To start with we must immediately formulate a comprehensive national policy, both short and long term, to address this disaster. We also must create a structure within the government that will have a singular focus to tackle the arsenic problem. So far the location of all government activities in the LGRD ministry has been a mistake. This ministry already has its hands full and cannot be expected to address this disaster.

We propose the formation of an inter-ministerial body -- perhaps a Task Force -- located at the PMO and headed by the PM herself with a very high level secretariat empowered to take quick and decisive action. Along with it we need an expert group, taken from all those who are active both within and outside the government to form the brains trust for all government policies. At the same time we must request all donors to act in a coordinated manner and with the Task Force. At present too many donors are spending a lot of money without really knowing if the resources are being effectively spent.

The biggest challenge before the nation is to provide alternative source of safe water for our people other than tube-wells. The alternative, as we see it, is only one --going back to the consumption of surface water and water collected from rain. We realise that we are talking of a massive change of a habit that has grown over the last two decades of using tube-well water. It is also extremely easy to use requiring virtually no effort in storing and preserving. However the task is not as difficult as it may seem at first. Bangladesh ranks No.2 in the world in terms of possessing fresh water reserve, most of it in our rivers and ponds, which require to be made germ free. Simple and affordable water purifying methods will have to be popularised. As for rainwater, affordable method of collecting and preserving it will have to be introduced.

As is evident from above the tasks before us are enormous, urgent and multifaceted. We are heartened by the interest the PM and the President have shown in this matter. We hope that the official conference, which will end tomorrow, will respond to most of the suggestions we have given above. The most important is that we need to act collectively and urgently.

Source: The Daily Star 15. 01. 02

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5.Arsenic, cricket and the WB
by M.I. Hasan

AS an occasional visitor to Bangladesh and intermittent reader of The Daily Star, it was a delight over the past few days to read the sardonic pieces by Afsan Chowdhury both in the op-ed section (on Arsenic) and in the sports section (on our cricket team). He must be congratulated for his writing. They are so different from the drab stuffs: bringing in gynaecologists, the Finance Minister, the IMF-World Bank. In his accounts of the recent jamboree organized on the Arsenic problem as well as non-performing of the cricket team, and the economy and/or the Finance Minister.

It is refreshing to read the wry humour in his analyses of the current sad scenarios in Bangladesh, with the hint of the tragic-comic consequences on the country. The dubious roles of the Government and 'donors', such as the World Bank (WB) and the Japanese agency, over the past decade regarding the Arsenic problem needs to be exposed further. How so much money is being spent (mostly on self-serving seminars), how money borrowed by the Government of Bangladesh from the World Bank is being used mostly for unrealistic advice from foreign consultants, and how different donors (such as the Japanese or the Canadians) have banded together to make their own deals without making much of dent yet on the widespread Arsenic problem.

Another aspect that requires more exposure, of course, is how weak-kneed governments in Bangladesh have fallen prey to these donors peddling their agenda and not-so-relevant ideas. The recent non-productive exchange between the IMF-World Bank and the Government (read the current Finance Minister) has again exemplified the uneven nature of these deals. It was astounding (as an expatriate familiar with the worlds of international finance) to see the coverage and the courtesies given to the IMF team last week culminating in a meeting with the Prime Minister, no less! I guess the Finance Minister presumes now that pleasing the IMF-WB operatives by making self-deprecatory off-the-cuff remarks is more worthwhile than proper protocol and maintaining self-esteem of the nation!

On the other side, the second-rate professionals at IMF-WB (as characterized by Nobel winner Joseph Stiglitz) must be chuckling at giving nothing away and at the same time getting uncalled for royal treatment unlike elsewhere (except possibly for some banana republics!) -- and in the bargain finally getting a Finance Minister to mouth their own agenda in his dialect.

A similar syndrome, of over-reaching and mouthing more than one can deliver, seems to afflict the sports arena. As reported recently, myopic politics in the land-grabbing tradition as applied to the Football Federation has led to the FIFA banning Bangladesh, where the game was going from bad to worse anyway. On the other side, the cricket team continues on what must be a record-breaking run of pathetic performance as a Test team and, notwithstanding all the media hype and the politically-correct changes also in the Cricket Board, it is difficult to visualize any significant improvement. It would indeed be more self-respecting for our men to 'retire hurt' now from Tests instead of plumbing low levels of performance to the point of absurdity, including recruiting gynaecologists.

Similar to the case of the misplaced gynaecologists serving the cricket team(s), the roles of the IMF-WB and the local midwives in charge of the Bangladesh economy now also need to be realistically evaluated. And in such an arduous task of self-analysis for the nation that must be undertaken sooner rather than later -- not by the parasitical breed of consultants and pundits -- the role of an honest media would be crucial.

Source: The Daily Star, 21. 01. 02

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6. Arsenic-Poisoning and an uncertain Future
by Sylvia Mortoza, 10. 05. 01

A two-week survey carried out by DCH/SOES team between December 1998 to January, 1999 covering 10 villages of 8 districts that has turned up more patients than expected is a bad portent for us all. What this means is that, either the situation is worse than we thought, or that we are incapable of keeping pace with its advance.

When we learn that arsenic in the groundwater of one village in Bogra is as high as 1.5 mg/l, we should be worried. This causes us to think that other villages and other districts are similarly afflicted.. This idea is borne out by the information coming out of yet another village, Izrapara, in Sarisabari, which now is identified as the village with the largest number of people affected by arsenic-poisoning as more than half the people doctors examined already have the tell-tale signs of skin lesions. Worse still, out of 48 children below the ages of 11 examined, 16.6% are similarly afflicted.

With much the same story coming out of almost all the villages now being tested for arsenic-contamination, it is time to take stock of the situation and measure it against our achievements especially when we hear that people in villages like Chattarpaya of Thana Senbag, are still drinking the water from tubewells which are known to have a high concentration of arsenic. This particular village also has the dubious distinction of being the village with the highest concentration of arsenic (4.7 mg/l) found anywhere in the world.

What is sad about it is that years after the problem was uncovered, villagers in many places are not only drinking water that is contaminated with arsenic but are blissfully unaware that they are being poisoned or that the skin lesions they see have been caused by this poison. This scenario is being constantly repeated around the countryside and smacks of inefficiency on the part of the authorities. Arsenic mitigation programmes in Kushtia and elsewhere in the southwestern region of the country has, according to reports, also suffered a setback due to a similar lack of concern. In fact it may even be correct to say that nobody seems to be responsible for supervising the programmes undertaken either by the government or private NGOs. That people are still ignorant of what has befallen them is hard to accept as UNICEF appointed a publicity agent to inform and educate the people on all aspects of contamination and arsenic-poisoning.

One major problem being encountered is that people believe that the illnesses and diseases caused by the ingesting of arsenic are the work of evil spirits. If this is allowed to continue, treating patients becomes almost impossible and gives a chance for charlatans to take over. But there is another problem many doctors at the health complexes in Upazilas are so divorced from the problem they are unable to recognise arsenic-induced illnesses when they see them.

This can be easily remedied by refresher courses and by diseeminating knowledge on these diseases to all medical personnel. The result of such ignorance is easy to tell as these doctors could prescribe incorrect courses of treatment for the smitten which can be very dangerous. In just one village, seven members of a family are reported to have died because the cause of their illnesses was unknown until a team of doctors from the Rajshahi Medical College came and identified it. Other difficulties being encountered by the people are related to the sealing or marking in red of contaminated tubewells WITHOUT ENSURING AN ALTERNATIVE SOURCE OF DRINKING WATER. The obvious result of suchs neglect is that the people have no other choice but to drink the water from the tubewells, knowing them to be contaminated. It is quite one thing to drink contaminated water unknowingly but to know one is consuming a known poison must be a nightmare, especially for parents of small children. Another problem being encountered is that many villagers do not comprehend the danger especially when the same tubewell has been used for years without anyone getting sick. This is certainly something difficult to explain to people, so if people believe the tubule is safe and their illnesses are caused by evil spirits, who can blame them?

Although there are reports that the government is pondering digging some covered ring wells with hand pumps to alleviate the problem of a shortage of arsenic-free drinking water, generally it can be seen that little has been done to implement this plan. Although the DPHE has a scheme to install 40 ring wells within the district, still no ring-well has been installed despite the selection of contractors. The officials are not even sure how many people in their area are suffering from arsenic-poisoning, although an unconfirmed survey report does say that 40 per cent of the people are sick. When asked, these officials are likely to blame the shortage of manpower as the reason for the lack of action but as Arsenic Control Committees have been formed at the grass-root level, (i.e. the ward level to district level) no programme for creating an awareness among the people about arsenic contamination, water management, nutrition or which measures to take to face the arsenic threat appears to have been taken up.

In Chapainawabganj, a project under the auspices of the Watsan Partnership Project (WPP) is now underway in 160 villages of 3 upazilas. The WPP works in partnership with three other organisations, CARE, DASCO and IDEA and 15 local NGOs and their joint programme consists of creating awareness among the people of the harmful effects of consuming arsenic-contaminated water. It also includes the transfer of technology for the removal of arsenic from the water as well as a programme for identifying patients. Such projects are worthy efforts but, although it would seem that removing or reducing the arsenic in the groundwater is simple, applying such remedies as are available have not always been acceptable to the people. The problem with this is that, though many, if not all of these treatments work, if they are not acceptable to people, or people cannot understand the basic concept, these will all become useless as soon as supervision is removed.

If despite international coverage on the disaster, policy-makers are still unable to comprehend the seriousness of the situation we are in, the nation is in trouble for, if solutions are not in the process of being put in place, they should be. Nowadays, small babies are also showing signs of poisoning. This should have been expected as arsenic is a "teratogen" meaning it can jump the placenta barrier. That this problem warrants our undivided attention seems to be missed. First and foremost people must be told what ails them and they must be told what they can expect and taught to recognise the symptoms of arsenic-poisoning for themselves. If they make a mistake in diagnosis, this is not important but arsenic-poisoning is, for when consumed over a long period of time it can be a cause of skin, liver, lung, kidney and bladder cancer.

Already it has become an outsize burden on the country's health services and for this reason alone we must reduce exposure to arsenic-contaminated water to as near to zero as possible. Meanwhile we must intensify the search for reliable alternative sources of water. But as Bangladesh is a country of approximately 127 million people, this is no easy task, which in itself makes the problem unique. This difficulty is all the more painful when we know that caught in the early stages, arsenic-poisoning can be reversed by providing people with arsenic-free water. This means the longer we wait to take put alternative arrangements in place, the worse it will be for us all.

Time for Action

Jamal Anwar

SOS-arsenic.net

Critical Reports

Content :

Time for Action

Content

1. Whose Fault

2. Wrong Results

3. What is Wrong ?

4. Arsenic Contaminated Water and Disposal of Arsenic from Municipalities Supply System

5. Stop and Abandon Tube Wells

6. Project Report

7. Images

8. Whither Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper