Barrackpore, April 25: A gastro-enteritis outbreak has claimed three lives and left over a thousand ill since Saturday at Garulia in North 24-Parganas, about 30 km from Calcutta.

Over 400 people have had to be hospitalised and 250 children are said to have taken ill.

District magistrate Manoj Pant said Jabbal Majhi, 40, died last night. Arati Prasad, 50, and Bablu Sahani, 24, died today. Jabbal died at Balaram Seva Mandir in Khardah, Arati at B.N. Bose hospital and Bablu at home. Unconfirmed reports put the toll at six.

Three special health camps have been set up in the affected area where half-a-dozen doctors have been posted to attend emergency cases. Over 700 people have been treated at the camps since yesterday.

Pant said there was no dearth of medicines or oral re-hydration salt. ?We have issued an order to the hospitals asking them to purchase medicines from the open market, if required. The bills will be paid by the administration.?

The report of the gastro outbreak spread panic in Garulia and its neighbourhood.

Director of health services Prabhakar Chatterjee, who visited the six affected wards of Garulia municipality during the day, said about 700 cases were serious. Chatterjee also visited B.N. Bose Hospital.

An official said efforts were being made to ensure supply of safe drinking water.

?It appears that the entire drinking water supply system in the area has somehow become contaminated. New deep tube-wells are being dug to provide safe drinking water. We have also ordered fresh supply of oral re-hydration salt solution packets for the hospitals where the afflicted have been admitted,? Chatterjee said.

The district?s chief medical officer, Kusum Adhikary, said the first gastro-enteritis cases were reported on Friday. ?From Saturday, the number of afflicted people began to rise. Yesterday, patients poured in to the three hospitals in the area and we realised that we had an outbreak on our hands. We have already collected samples of drinking water from the affected blocks and sent them for laboratory tests.?

Officials from the National Institute for Cholera and Enteric Diseases also collected drinking water samples.