Dengue stings tricity, but fails to wake up health officials

Charu Chhibber

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, September 8

With 282 confirmed cases of dengue and five deaths, the tricity is in the grip of a dengue crisis. Mohali district has recorded 229 cases, the highest in the tricity, followed by Panchkula, which has reported 28 confirmed cases so far. Chandigarh has recorded 25 cases of dengue. However, the spiralling number of dengue cases has failed to wake up the health authorities.

A fresh case of dengue was reported from the city yesterday. According to health officials, the patient is a resident of Sector 40. Five dengue deaths have been reported from city hospitals so far, including one patient each from Yamunanagar, Kharar, Jalandhar, Jind and Raipur Rani. As for malaria, 31 cases have been reported from the city so far.

While health officials claim measures are being taken to control the spread of the disease in the tricity, residents have a different story to tell.

“The Health Department is not taking enough preventive measures. In the past one month, several dengue cases have been reported, but I only remember witnessing fogging in our area twice,” rued Ritu Mehra, a resident of Sector 11, Panchkula.

She said fumigation was not an effective prevention measure. “The insecticides used in fumigation and fogging have severe side effects on humans, especially children,” she said.

“They are not warning and educating people appropriately. Are they waiting for the little outbreak to turn into a big one?” questioned Shailja, a resident of Dadu Majra.

Another city resident, Jagdish Chandra, from Modern Housing Complex said, “The health officials must encourage isolation of infected people, be more belligerent about trapping mosquitoes, and warn pregnant women who could suffer complications. Just getting coolers emptied is not enough.”

Meanwhile, Dr Gaurav Aggarwal, anti-malaria officer, UT Health Department, said officials of the department were taking all preventive measures for dengue control.

“Our teams are conducting house-to-house surveys, anti-larval activities, on-the-spot cooler emptying, and fogging in all sectors as per schedule. Besides, we have issued over 1,900 notices and 28 challans to defaulters,” Dr Aggarwal said.

He said there was no need to panic. “Every fever case in not dengue. See a doctor in case of fever, get tests done as prescribed and do not panic,” he said.

Detailed coverage on page 5