Buying juice? Don’t touch those used mineral water bottles
IF you have ever taken any juices packed in a mineral water bottle, it is most likely that the bottle you drunk from was picked from a heap of garbage. Emptied mineral water bottles dumped on Kampala City garbage skips end up being re-used.
By Chris Kiwawulo
IF you have ever taken any juices packed in a mineral water bottle, it is most likely that the bottle you drunk from was picked from a heap of garbage. Emptied mineral water bottles dumped on Kampala City garbage skips end up being re-used.
Several street kids roam around garbage skips in Kampala, pick the dumped bottles and sell them to food vendors at a give-away price of sh100 each. Street kids collect the bottles irrespective of the stench and flies buzzing around them. They put the bottles in dirty polythene bags, most probably picked from dustbins as well. Their intent is to get money and earn a living at the expense of public life!
A 13-year-old street kid only identified as Bob said all he cares about is the money he gets from selling the bottles. He doesn’t care about any possibility of spreading diseases. “There is ready market for these bottles. We get cash as soon as we take them,†he said.
According to a recent research by the Uganda Youth Development Link (UYDEL), street kids depend on collecting bottles and old metals around town, which they sell to buy food, bhang and petrol for sniffing.
UYDEL’s drug abuse rehabilitation officer, Benjamin Byarugaba said, “Since the kids spend the night outside, they have to smoke bhang and sniff petrol to fall asleep.â€
Food vendors clean the bottles and re-fill them with either cold passion fruit juice or bushera that they serve alongside food.
However, their method of washing the bottles is not enough to remove all the dirt and germs. Dr Paul Semugoma, a microbiology scholar, says such bottles cannot withstand heat treatment. The viable alternative would be to soak them in chemical sterilisers. “I don’t think they are doing that,†he said.
With such a trend, Kampala city remains prone to the outbreak of pandemics like cholera dysentery and diarrhoea. KCC has blamed the outbreak of such pandemics to the poor sanitation evident in various slums in Bwaise, Nakawa and Katanga among others.
The commissioner for community health in the Ministry of Health, Dr Sam Okware, said they had received several complaints over the issue and told vendors to stop it.
“It is really a serious problem because most samples taken by UNBS recently revealed content of faecal material in the drinks,†said Okware.
He said epidemics like cholera, dysentery, diarrhoea and other serious complications can easily crop up when people continue taking such dirty drinks.
He warned the public against taking such drinks, saying they were putting their lives at stake.
KCC’s health inspector, Dr Messach Mubiru, said if any body was caught selling drinks from dirty containers like used mineral water bottles, they could be charged under public health laws.
“In fact the best thing is to throw the bottle away. I have not come across them yet but we are going to do surveillance and when we find them, we shall stop them immediately. Whoever persists shall face court action,†Mubiru said.
He warned that people should not earn money at the expense of public health.
IF you have ever taken any juices packed in a mineral water bottle, it is most likely that the bottle you drunk from was picked from a heap of garbage. Emptied mineral water bottles dumped on Kampala City garbage skips end up being re-used.
Several street kids roam around garbage skips in Kampala, pick the dumped bottles and sell them to food vendors at a give-away price of sh100 each. Street kids collect the bottles irrespective of the stench and flies buzzing around them. They put the bottles in dirty polythene bags, most probably picked from dustbins as well. Their intent is to get money and earn a living at the expense of public life!
A 13-year-old street kid only identified as Bob said all he cares about is the money he gets from selling the bottles. He doesn’t care about any possibility of spreading diseases. “There is ready market for these bottles. We get cash as soon as we take them,†he said.
According to a recent research by the Uganda Youth Development Link (UYDEL), street kids depend on collecting bottles and old metals around town, which they sell to buy food, bhang and petrol for sniffing.
UYDEL’s drug abuse rehabilitation officer, Benjamin Byarugaba said, “Since the kids spend the night outside, they have to smoke bhang and sniff petrol to fall asleep.â€
Food vendors clean the bottles and re-fill them with either cold passion fruit juice or bushera that they serve alongside food.
However, their method of washing the bottles is not enough to remove all the dirt and germs. Dr Paul Semugoma, a microbiology scholar, says such bottles cannot withstand heat treatment. The viable alternative would be to soak them in chemical sterilisers. “I don’t think they are doing that,†he said.
With such a trend, Kampala city remains prone to the outbreak of pandemics like cholera dysentery and diarrhoea. KCC has blamed the outbreak of such pandemics to the poor sanitation evident in various slums in Bwaise, Nakawa and Katanga among others.
The commissioner for community health in the Ministry of Health, Dr Sam Okware, said they had received several complaints over the issue and told vendors to stop it.
“It is really a serious problem because most samples taken by UNBS recently revealed content of faecal material in the drinks,†said Okware.
He said epidemics like cholera, dysentery, diarrhoea and other serious complications can easily crop up when people continue taking such dirty drinks.
He warned the public against taking such drinks, saying they were putting their lives at stake.
KCC’s health inspector, Dr Messach Mubiru, said if any body was caught selling drinks from dirty containers like used mineral water bottles, they could be charged under public health laws.
“In fact the best thing is to throw the bottle away. I have not come across them yet but we are going to do surveillance and when we find them, we shall stop them immediately. Whoever persists shall face court action,†Mubiru said.
He warned that people should not earn money at the expense of public health.