90pc Dhaka residents victims of air pollution: green activists

Green activists on Saturday voiced deep concern that around 90 per cent of the residents in Dhaka city were affected by serious dust pollution and urged the authorities concerned to take effective steps to check it.
Speaking at a human chain programme, they also said that the intensity of dust pollution rose during winter due to road digging and delayed disposal of wastes, causing spread of various respiratory, allergy and skin diseases.
The Poribesh Bachao Andolan and the Nagorik Odhikar Sangrakkhan Forum along with some other likeminded organisations jointly organised the programme in front of the Department of Fine Arts of Dhaka University in the capital’s Shahbagh area.
Poba chairman Abu Naser Khan, general secretary Ferdous Ahmed Ujjal, Nagorik Odhikar Sangrakkhan Forum general secretary M Toyab Ali, Samajik Andolon Sangstha president Humayun Kabir Bhuiyan and Poribesh Andolon Mancha president Amir Hasan Masud, among others, addressed the programme, said a press release.
They said that around 40 per cent of the patients being treated in the child wards of different hospitals were admitted with respiratory diseases during winter due to serious dust pollution.
The environmentalists also said that dust pollution was also hitting the economy hard and harming the environment apart from causing public sufferings and health hazards.
They demanded that the government should take quick steps to check dust pollution and step up action against those responsible.
The green activists also put forwarded a 12-point recommendation, including removal of construction materials and excavated soil from the roadsides quickly after repair works, regular cleaning of roads and footpaths, not keeping construction materials in open places or beside the roads, taking effective steps against different factories polluting the air and creating awareness among city dwellers about the dust pollution and its adverse impacts.

News Courtesy: www.newagebd.net