Mysterious deaths in Jammu and Kashmir: Certain neurotoxins found in samples of dead persons

Jammu: Amid growing concern over the mysterious death of 14 persons in a remote village in Jammu and Kashmir over the past one month, health experts on Tuesday said certain neurotoxins have been found in the samples of the deceased. Further investigations are in progress, the experts said.

The death toll due to the mysterious disease in a remote village of the Rajouri district of Jammu and Kashmir has risen to 14 with two more members of a family including a six-year-old girl succumbing to it, officials said on Tuesday.

The 14 fatalities including those of 11 children and three elders in three families in the last 30 days have caused panic among the residents of Badhaal village of Koteranka sub-division in Rajouri. The government has deployed various health teams to collect samples to identify and address the potential health risks, the officials said.

According to the health experts, no viral, bacterial or microbial infection was found to cause these deaths after carrying out extensive microbiological studies.

"These were found to be localised and possibly having some epidemiological linkage," an official spokesman said, quoting the experts briefing a meeting chaired by Chief Secretary Atal Dulloo here.

Dulloo chaired the meeting of all the concerned from divisional and district administrations alongwith health experts from several national health institutions to take stock of the measures taken so far to identify the real causes behind the mysterious deaths reported from the village.

The government has taken several measures including rushing rapid response teams, carrying out investigations of samples from humans and animals and testing of water and food items besides taking assistance from reputed health institutions of the country to know about the actual causes behind these deaths.

The chief secretary impressed upon the health and police departments to assess the reports received from different institutes of repute to identify the real cause of these deaths.

He asked them to work in close coordination to take the investigation to its logical conclusion.

"The reports furnished by different institutions are now available with us and more are going to be received soon. These should be enough to conclude the investigations and reach to possible reasons for these deaths reported from this particular village," he said.

Dulloo sought suggestions from the health experts about the future course of action to be taken from here.

He directed the police department to utilise the best of their resources to study these reports along with using other scientific measures to reach the conclusion.

He also urged the health department to study these reports to find the reasonable leads causing these deaths, the spokesman said.