With the advent of summer, diarrhoea has broken out in an epidemic form in the capital city of Dhaka mainly due to scarcity of pure drinking water. More than one thousand diarrhoea-affected people were admitted to the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Diseases Research, Bangladesh (ICDDRB) during last two days, according to sources in ICDDRB. "The major cause of outbreak of diarrhoea in different parts of the capital is acute shortage of pure drinking water. Virus of different water borne diseases has been found in water supplied by WASA. Many people of the capital city are falling victim to water borne diseases after drinking impure water," said a doctor of ICDDRB. During a visit to the ICDDRB on Thursday, it was found that on an average more than 50 diarrhoea patients were getting admitted to the hospital every one hour. And their number stood at 700 at the end of the day. The ICDDRB authorities have set up extra tents on the hospital premises to cope with the unusual rush of diarrhoea patients. Talking to the New Nation, on duty doctors said that the patients were coming mainly from Mirpur, Mohammadpur, Jattrabari and old parts of the city and most of them are children and aged people. "We provide different categories of treatment to the patients. We usually suggest breast-feeding for the diarrhoea hit children aged below 6 months along with oral saline. We also advise them to purify water by boiling or using tablet," said a doctor of ICRRRB. Dr. Azaharul Islam Khan, Chief of ICDDRB Stay unit, said diarrhoea assumes an epidemic form during a certain period in our country. We all should work together to take preventive measures to tackle the water borne diseases, he added. Usually water borne diseases spread rapidly between April and July every year. But this year it has broken out on a large scale from the month of March. Temperature change, scarcity of pure drinking and ignorance of people are mainly blamed for the outbreak of water borne diseases during this period, he informed. He a suggested setting up of region based healthcare centre especially for diarrhoea diseases to save patients from the hazards of coming to ICDDRB from far away places. During spot visit to Mirpur, Mohammadpur and Jatabari areas, it was noticed that water supply pipes were leaked due to digging of roads haphazardly. Household materials, dust, garbage and germs of various diseases safely entered into the WASA pipes and polluted water posing a threat to public health. Unfortunately. The WASA authority paid no heed to this problem despite repeated complaints by the people, residents of these areas alleged. Aklima, an inhabitant of Naya Bazar area and a victim of diarrhoea, said that for the last two weeks she has been getting bad smell from the piped water .It was also muddy, she complained. When contacted, an official of public relations department of WASA said water might be adulterated due to entry of germs and polluted materials through leaked pipes as most of them are very old. But we take immediate steps to repair them after receiving complaint, he added. He claimed that water supplied by WASA is completely pure. When contacted over phone, Abdullah Haroon Pasha, Chairman of Dhaka WASA board, advised this reporter to contact engineer Md Raihanul Abedin. But someone on behalf of Abedin said he (Abedin) is otherwise busy.