PHNOM PENH, 17. November 2008: Arsenic contamination of the Mekong River and groundwater is putting millions of residents at risk of severe illness due to arsenic poisoning, the UN and NGOs warned.
After surveying wells along the Mekong river, which flows through Lao PDR, Cambodia and Vietnam, the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and governments concluded that as many as 1.7 million people were at risk of arsenic poisoning, whose long-term symptoms include skin lesions and cancer.
In some provinces along the Mekong River in Vietnam and Cambodia, residents are exposed to 30 times the acceptable level of arsenic, according to data from the Vietnam Ministry of Health.
“Arsenic contamination in the Mekong is understood to have been caused by recent sedimentation,” says Thowai Sha Zai, chief of UNICEF’s water, environment, and sanitation (WES) division in Vietnam.
Kilde: http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=81493
