A seven-year-old indigenous boy was sent to a hospital with fever yesterday, taking the number of children suffering from one unknown disease to 87 in Sitakunda upazila of Chittagong.

Earlier, nine children suspected of having been infected by the same disease died at Sonachori union's Tripura Para last week. On Saturday, a dozen children, of another village in Bogulabazar area, were admitted to hospital with similar symptoms.

Upazila Health Officer Nurul Karim said staff of the local administration were visiting the villages of Sitakunda and sending the children with similar symptoms to hospitals.

“The seven-year-old boy, who was admitted to the hospital today, has relatives in Sonachori. He visited the area recently. That's why we sent him to hospital, since he was suffering from fever.”

With the boy, as many as 87 children from three villages, where mostly people of the indigenous Tripura community live, have been hospitalised.

Chittagong civil surgeon Azizur Rahman Siddique said the condition of the admitted children was good now.

Of the hospitalised children, around 50 are receiving treatment at Chittagong Medical College Hospital (CMCH). The rest are at Bangladesh Institute of Tropical and Infectious Disease (BITID) in Sitakunda's Fouzdarhat.

Five children were shifted from the BITID to the CMCH yesterday afternoon.

Mala Rani Tripura, mother of six-year-old Rumi Tripura, said her daughter's condition had not improved in the BITID, which was why doctors referred her to the CMCH.