Some residents leave Pasir Gudang to escape chemical fumes
Teacher says her two children have been suffering symptoms like coughing and sore eyes.
JOHOR BAHRU: A number of residents have temporarily moved out of pollution-hit Pasir Gudang to escape the toxic chemical waste pollution emitting from Sungai Kim Kim.
Mahirah Ahmad Helmi, 32, has taken her two children, aged three years and five months, to stay at her father-in-law’s house in Kempas here.
Mahirah, a teacher at SMK Kota Masai 2, said her older child has been coughing over the past few days while the younger one suffers from sore eyes.
She had taken both of them for treatment at the Sultan Ismail Hospital here.
Mahirah, from Taman Kota Masai, said that several of her neighbours have also left.
“They feel that their lives are under threat,” she said, adding that she hoped Sungai Kim Kim would be cleaned up soon to prevent the situation from getting worse.
Abdul Rahim Abdul Rahman, 47, a resident at Taman Bukit Dahlia, said he checked into a hotel with his three children last night.
“The schools are closed and the children cannot attend classes anyway,” he said.
The education ministry yesterday ordered the closure of all 111 schools in the Pasir Gudang district until further notice.
The chemical waste dumped into the river released toxic fumes which started affecting the people, many of them schoolchildren, since March 7.
So far, 947 people have sought treatment at the Sultan Ismail Hospital.
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Nine of them are warded in the intensive care unit.