About 20 million drink arsenic-laced water in Bangladesh

Nearly 20 million people in Bangladesh still consume water poisoned with high levels of arsenic, about 20 years after the potentially deadly toxin was discovered in the supply, Human Rights Watch said Wednesday.

According to the media reports, the HRW said in a report that an estimated 43,000 people die each year from arsenic-related illness in Bangladesh, mostly in poor rural areas.

The 111-page report, titled "Nepotism and Neglect: The Failing Response to Arsenic in the Drinking Water of Bangladesh’s Rural Poor," finds a serious lack of monitoring and quality control in arsenic mitigation projects.

The report also documents how the health system in Bangladesh largely ignores the impact of exposure to arsenic on the public health.

Richard Pearshouse, a researcher with the HRW, has said that the government in Dhaka has failed to adequately respond to naturally occurring arsenic in drinking water across large rural areas.

"Bangladesh isn't taking basic, obvious steps to get arsenic out of the drinking water of millions of its rural poor," Pearshouse said.

"The reasons why this huge tragedy has remained so pervasive are due to poor governance."

Experts say arsenic is found in water from hand-pumped, mostly shallow, tube wells across huge swaths of rural areas in the country.

SS