Ensure quality food, water at eateries near Dhaka Airport: foreign ministry
The government today instructed the authorities concerned to ensure quality food and water in the nearby hotels and restaurants of the Dhaka airport, as migrant workers are reporting sickness after arriving in different Middle East destinations, especially in Qatar and the UAE.
The government came up with the instruction at an inter-ministerial meeting at the Foreign Ministry.
The meeting was held after a number of Qatar and UAE-bound workers suffered from diarrhea and other stomach-related illnesses in the last few days.
The meeting was chaired by Foreign Ministry Secretary (East) Mashfee Binte Shams.
Representatives of Ministry of Health, Ministry of Civil Aviation and Tourism, Ministry of Expatriates' Welfare and Overseas Employment, Department of Food, Bangladesh Standard and Testing Institute, Dhaka North and South City Corporation, WASA, Civil Aviation Authority of Bangladesh, Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport and other authorities concerned were present at the meeting.
"Those who are leaving Bangladesh are getting sick after reaching there. We, therefore, held a meeting with various stakeholders. The matter needs to be brought under control," the foreign secretary told reporters emerging from the meeting.
Mashfee Binte Shams said several recommendations were made in the meeting.
According to meeting sources, the short-term plans include ensuring quality food in hotels and restaurants, raising public awareness about healthy and clean food, increasing water quality through chlorine use in the surrounding areas of the airport.
It was also decided that BSTI and safe food authorities and Dhaka North City Corporation will increase monitoring to ensure safe food and water around the airport areas.
Responding to a query at a press conference at the foreign ministry on Wednesday, State Minister for Foreign Affairs M Shahriar Alam said they were aware that Bangladeshi workers were falling sick in the United Arab Emirates and Qatar.
This happened in some places and it is not a large-scale outbreak, the state minister said.
So far, the ministry learned about 120 workers fell sick in the UAE and another 60 workers in Qatar, he said, adding the ministry has informed Bangladesh embassies in respective countries regarding the matter.
Asked, Dr Shahriar Sazzad, chief of the health desk, HSIA told The Daily Star yesterday that the expatriate workers, mainly the UAE-bound workers, are falling sick as they need to come to the airport 10 to 12 hours ahead of their flight for carrying out Covid-19 test.
He said as they need to stay for long hours, they often take unsafe and unhealthy food and water from the roadside hotels and restaurants and fall sick.
Group Captain AHM Touhid-ul-Ahsan, executive director, HSIA said, "We are conducting operations on a regular basis so that the food and water at the food corners and restaurants at the airport remain safe. But in case of outside food, we cannot do anything,"
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