By IANS
Villahermosa (Mexico) : Army has been deployed at a food market in this southern city of Mexico to prevent hungry and desperate flood victims from eating spoiled food, Spanish news agency EFE reported Friday.
About 500 poor residents in the northern part of Villahermosa, which like most of the city and surrounding state of Tabasco remained underwater for about 10 days in recent floods, reportedly collected several tonnes of food, drinks and medicines that were thrown out at the Jose Maria Pino Suarez market of the city.
Victor Torres, the spokesman for the Sanitary Risks Commission of the Tabasco government, meanwhile, advised people to avoid consuming spoiled food. “We don’t want epidemics, and that’s why we’re here. The people who eat that food will get sick,” said Torres.
About 100 workers of the state health department have been sent into the streets of the city to prevent the public from eating putrid food, Torres added.
Meanwhile, city Mayor Evaristo Hernandez told reporters that the authorities would have to remove at least 1.2 million tonnes of trash from the central part of the city. He informed newsmen that a new sanitary landfill would begin operating on the outskirts of the city from next weekend.
Health authorities are currently distributing masks to local people to deal with the stinking atmosphere around the area and also provided some 20,000 injections over the past few days to prevent the locals suffering from tetanus and influenza.
After remaining submerged for over a week, the city is slowly returning to normal although it is still filled with mud and pervaded by the stench overflowing sewers and of decomposed animal corpses.
At least three people have been killed and more than a million rendered homeless by the torrential rain.