BANGALORE: With the onset of summer, the number of cases registered in the hospitals for various health related issues is increasing.
Narayana Netralaya Chief Dr Bhujanga Shetty said, “The city is now an allergic capital. Everyday, our hospital is seeing the increase in the number of patients. About 10 to 15 patients are coming with conjunctivitis and 8 to 10 patients come with allergy complaints. Conjunctivitis is common because of the heat, but we are surprised about more people coming with dustallergy.”
Bangalore East, with a huge number of construction activities, is witnessing a scary proportion of patients with dust allergy and dryness in the eye.
“We get about 80 patients every month during this season at Navashakti Netralaya Hospital in Indiranagar and I am a visiting ophthalmologist of Columbia Asia Hospital where I see at least three patients everyday with eye infection. This is due to pollen counts falling from the trees during summer and also suspended minute dust particles mixed in the atmosphere. This results in dryness, red eye and frequent watering,” said Dr P Elankumar, AIIMS.
Dr Savitha Arun, Senior Consultant and Ophthalmologist at the Nethradhama Eye Hospital, observed, “Dust allergy is common during this season and the type of infection during this season is called as Spring Catarrh (eyes effected by cataract) or spring conjunctivitis which is a chronic inflammation of eye aggravated during the spring-and-summer period”.
Due to the work pressure and time constraints, many people take their own medication like antibiotics which could prove fatal in the long run, added Savitha Arun.
Meanwhile, the Karnataka State Pollution Control Board has released the statistics of 13 different locations through High Volume Samplers to record the dust particles and carbon emissions emitted by traffic and found out that Bangalore East has the highest polluted zone with 122 micrograms.
“We have Whitefield, Mahadevapura, K R Puram and Marathalli in the East where construction activities are more and traffic makes the situation equally worse. Therefore, we can only ask the people to guard themselves to escape from dust and smoke,” Said Yatish, Regional Officer East Zone, Karnataka State Pollution Control Board.
He further stressed that the concentration of suspended particles is high in the atmosphere due to dry weather. The standard parameter of 60 micrograms is considered less. However, most parts of the city record more than 60 plus micrograms.
Top 5 Polluted Areas
*Whitefield
*Yeshwantpur
*City Railway Station
*BTM Layout-Outer Ring Road
*Mysore Road and Vijayanagar Chord Road intersection.