February 6th, 2010By Sopheap Chak
Originally posted at http://sopheapfocus.com/
The case of infectious diseases due to Yali Dam
Villagers in a remote Stung Treng’s Svay Rieng village living along the Sesan River reportedly appeal for health treatment assistant due to the infectious disease coming from dirty water flowing from the Yali dam in Vietnam. Majority of 200 families in this village are using the water from Sesan River in where dirty water, rubbish, and feces and water infiltrates from a red earth area are discharged from the Yali Dam located near Cambodia-Vietnam border.
This has resulted to different types of infectious diseases including diarrhea, itchy skin diseases, swollen limbs, typhoid, on the villagers; particularly the children. Over 20 children and adults have reportedly suffered from diarrhea and itchy skin disease since January 2010.
Notably, these kind of disease symptoms had never appeared in this village who always consumed the water from the river. The below video, in Khmer language, was reported by Radio Free Asia, where villagers were echoed their disease symptom and its root causes. Translation excerpt is available on the Mirror.
In fact, there have been much discussion and concerns by many stakeholders concerning the impact resulted from the building of the Yali Dam since 2000. The Vietnam’s $1 billion Yali Falls dam which was begun without prior Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) was later assessed by community-based groups who concluded that the dame has causes and is causing serious environmental and socio-economic impact to 20,000 people in 59 villages in the dam affected area, downstream on the Se San river in Cambodia’s Ratanakkiri and Steung Treng provinces.
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