mumbai there has been a threefold jump in hospitalisations due to hepatitis this june as compared to same period last year the bmcs health department on monday confirmed that kurla has been at the epicentre of a hepatitis outbreak accounting for 60 of the hospital admissions reported from across the citythere were 282 hospitalisations last month compared to 94 in june 2018 of the 282 admissions 169 were from kurla physicians from kurla concurred that they have been treating a deluge of cases since may when there were 88 admissions and hundreds of opd cases the bmc said that the kurla cases of hepatitis a and e were reported from sambhaji chowk buddha colony cst road mashrani lane and garden lane areas the primary cause seems to be pipeline leakage in the sambhaji chowk area that contaminated the drinking water the situation was perhaps aggravated by the consumption of ice water and juice while breaking fast during ramzan when many people tend to eat outside food said dr padmaja keskar bmcs executive health officer she added that the situation is much better than in april and may as last week only three water samples were found unfit doctors from the area said that most cases were of hepatitis e which is transmitted via the faecaloral route principally through contaminated water and can affect the liverwe have treated dozens of cases where patients have come with very high bilirubin levels of 1012 normal is 112 mgdl vomiting several abdominal pain a couple of patients have even come with liver failure some cases that came with deranged liver enzymes and bleeding had to be referred to higher centres said physician dr shahid barmare we have treated one case of liver failure from kurla but we could reverse the condition without a transplant said hepatologist dr akash shukla from global hospital there were also nearly 800 hospitalisations due to gastroenteritis in june