Muhammed Anas, Baladi News, Damascus
The emergency department in the medical office in Al-Maraj region confirmed receiving dozens of food poisoning cases in Al-Shofonia noting that the number of medical cases reached 265. The cases suffered many symptoms such as: stomachache, vomiting, diarrhea, fever, low blood pressure and pulse acceleration.
The medical office pointed out that the number of the treated cases in the emergency department in Al-Marj hospital was 265 cases among which there were: 128 children, 62 women, and 30 men.
Field resources confirmed to Baladi News that the poisoning resulted from the rotten food meals that were distributed on Monday by charities as they daily give food meals to civilians, but with poorly packaging and storing with no cooling leading to rotting, in addition to not taking care of hygiene and packaging methods as well as cooking the meals in the charities' headquarters.
"The poisoning case in the eastern Ghouta can't be described as result of negligence, but cooking food this Ramadan is somehow unacceptable due to the high temperatures and power blackouts", according to Hassan Taki Al-Dein, the media activist.
"what happened in the eastern Ghouta resulted from health and social conditions. The first caused by the current high temperature amidst a stifling besiegement imposed by the regime on the eastern Ghouta that led to the fermentation of cooked food due to being packaged beforehand. As for the social case, there is a state of wastage due to the inability of some families to eat the provided food portions in one meal and thus they will rot because of the lack of fridges. Moreover, the majority of provided food is boiled rice with large amounts of meat, so according to the activist, it would have been better if the food meals were raw materials. In this case, there will be no wasting of extra food and greater prevention of poisoning cases will be.