HYDERABAD: The extreme levels of pollution of Musi river, a tributary of river Krishna and the city’s long-lost lifeline, has been debated and discussed to its core.
Over the years, the river bed has been encroached upon and converted into agriculture land and a large number of borewells have been dug up, leaving the people in the vicinity dependent mainly on the polluted underground water. What now emerges is a revelation: the river’s pollution continues to be a threat to the lives of people, especially pregnant women and their unborn children living in the area, a study points out.
“Musi’s pollution has reached such alarming levels that it has been causing miscarriages among pregnant women living in its vicinity,” a study called the ‘Effect of water pollution in Musi river’, published in March 2018, read. The threat of miscarriage comes from consuming contaminated fruits and vegetables grown on the river bed.
While everyone who consumes the produce grown on the river bed are at risk, the study stresses more on the vulnerability of women as they are more dependent on the polluted groundwater.
The study carried out by professors of Shadan Women’s College of Engineering and Technology and JNTU-H, cited another study and said that fishermen too have stopped fishing in the area, and the groundwater was not used for cultivation.
Dr Vimee Bindra, a consultant gynaecologist and infertility specialist of Apollo Health City, Jubilee Hills, was quoted in the study saying, “Miscarriage is indirectly related to Musi as consumption of contaminated vegetables and fruits grown on its bed will have an effect on pregnancy. A healthy pregnancy needs healthy nutrition (sic). So, if nutrition (food) is contaminated it will affect pregnancy either in the form of miscarriage, low birth weight, pre-term labour or congenital abnormality associated with some specific substances present in diet.”
Senior consultant physician Dr Hari Kishan Boorugu too pointed out in the study that high level of pollution was indirectly linked to human health and could cause miscarriage. “If groundwater is contaminated, it can result in many food-and-water borne infections like typhoid, hepatitis, listeriosis. Listeriosis, which is a food-borne disease, can cause miscarriage in pregnant women,” he said.