Aral Sea crisis continues to erode health TASHKENT (IRIN). Millions of people living near the Aral Sea face a bleak future, with health experts saying diseases like tuberculosis (TB) and cancer are having a terrible impact. The sea, located on the border of Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, was once the fourth largest lake in the world. However, it continues to shrink despite regional commitments to halt the draining of the rivers that feed it. It is now a quarter of its original size. In 1994, the governments of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan established the International Fund for Saving the Aral Sea (IFAS) to address the environmental impact. Usman Buranov, IFAS' technical director of the Global Environment Facility (GEF) projects, said that the health problems in the region were related to the low quality of drinking water. The polluted air around the sea contained a toxic cocktail of salt, pesticides and chemicals that contaminated drinking water and led to liver and kidney illnesses, as well as a variety of respiratory diseases. Meanwhile, the World Health Organization (WHO) said that there had been an increase in immune system disorders, birth abnormalities and cancer rates in the region. WHO said one problem specific to Uzbekistan was the high prevalence of bronchial asthma in Karakalpakstan, the autonomous region that borders the Aral Sea, while anaemia and TB were also endemic. In Muynak, a former port on the sea now 150 km from the water's edge, the number of TB cases had increased nearly 70 percent in the past decade, according to Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF), the health NGO that has been active in the region since 1997. IFAS said other serious conditions in the area were linked to a lack of jobs. The fishing industry, which once had an annual yield of 40,000 mt, collapsed in the 1980s. IFAS has created the Social Assistance Fund (SAF), a support programme for those living around the Aral Sea, to try and mitigate the ... Читать далее