The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh News : AIDS death holds village in dread

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Nov 11, 2004

Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh

AIDS death holds village in dread

By Our Staff Reporter

TOOPRAN, NOV. 10. Residents of Pothurajpalli, a small village in Toopran mandal of Medak district, are not drinking water as they believe they can get AIDS by doing so. A few days ago they discovered the body of a woman AIDS patient in the common drinking water tank of the village. Concerned by the foul smell emanating from their taps the villagers opened the water tank to find the putrefied body of Sampangi Potchamma (28), an AIDS patient. She got the deadly virus from her husband Sampangi Venkatesh who resorted to suicide five years ago after doctors confirmed him as having HIV.

Health camp

Realising that they had been drinking the same water for almost a week, people started vomiting and threw away all the food material cooked with the water from the tank. Many of them complained of nausea and severe headache. As the mass-sick syndrome spread, district health officers rushed to the village and were organising health camp in Pothurajpalli.

The district health officer, Jayaram, who visited the village, tried to pacify panic-stricken villagers that AIDS would not be transmitted through water. The water tank was cleaned and the water samples were sent for testing. Officers decided to continue the health camp for another week. "At present we are supplying drinking water through tanks and counselling the sick people."

The Toopran MRO, V Purushotham, said though Pothurajpalli residents demand that they be tested for HIV, health officers say that it will not be possible to send the samples to Hyderabad as they lack the required facility.

The MRO said that all those interested in a test would be taken to the government hospital at Sangareddy.

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