The worst affected districts are Varanasi, Jaunpur, Kannauj, Mirzapur, Gazipur and Lucknow, which have reported over 500 diarrhoea cases in the last one week.

While the district-level officials of the health department blame the unhygienic conditions for the spurt in diarrhoea cases, their seniors in Lucknow are of the pinion that village health and sanitation committees will be effective enough to bring the situation under control.

In the last one and a half months, around 10,000 cases and over 100 deaths from diarrhoea have been reported from various parts of the state. Thus, after Acute Encephalitis Syndrome, diarrhoea has become the second largest cause of mortality in the state.

“We are working hard to control the situation. While water logging remains the major problem in controlling the disease, there are some sensitive areas where despite our repeated requests people have not stopped eating pork. Thus even the cases of food poisoning are on the rise. The efforts are, however, on to spread more awareness about the disease,” said Dr Shradha Shukla, Chief Medical Officer (CMO) of Jaunpur District.

Meanwhile, district like Varanasi is also facing a similar problem. “Water logging in the slums areas coupled with unhygienic conditions and lack of cleanliness is adding to the problem. Even the cases of food poisoning are rising. The two main affected areas in the district are Badardia and Pindra. Both are low lying slums areas. We are continuously spraying DDT and spreading awareness about hygiene,” said Dr Ram Saran Verma, CMO (Varanasi).

On Sunday, eight fresh cases of diarrhoea were reported from the district.

The Health Department has sought help of Panchayati Raj Department to ensure proper cleaning of rural areas through village health and sanitation committees. “While majority of the districts have already formed such committees, remaining would follow soon,” said Prashant Trivedi, Secretary, Medical and Health.