Mosquitoes take over Kochi

KOCHI: While politicians were busy campaigning for the local body polls and the corporation health officials sat on files slowing down anti-mosquito drive, the vector population grew beyond control offering the residents sleepless nights. Health standing committee chairperson V.K. Minimol admitted that the mosquito population has gone up. Usually, anti-mosquito programmes start by September or October. “But this time, elections have derailed the schedule. As chemical spraying was not done in drains, mosquito larvae have grown in abundance,” she said.

The special squads formed by the civic body for mosquito eradication have now started functioning, she said. “This time, focus is given to chemical spraying as fogging is reported to have side effects,” she added. Vector Control Unit officer of the corporation Asok Kumar said mosquito attack will be the maximum during winter when daytime is hot and nights are cold. “That is the reason why residents are increasingly being attacked by the insects and not because of their high density,” he said.

The data available with District Vector Control Unit of Health Department shows that city has recorded low mosquito density of 62 MHD (man hour density) in December which is lower than the accepted normal density of 80. “In September, the density was 83.75, in October it was 75.5 and in November it was 80,” Mr Kumar said. Former health committee chairman and councillor T.K Ashraf is of the opinion that fogging and spraying will not have desired effect as the larvae has already grown into mosquitoes. “This should have been done by September,” he said.

And they eat up lots of funds too:

Mosquito control measures and the huge money spent by the city corporation for it has always been a political issue in Kochi. Mosquitoes have been ‘surviving’ in the city at an annual bill of Rs 2 to Rs 3 crore of the corporation for the last few decades. On an average, the civic body spends Rs 50 lakh to Rs 60 lakh every year for the purchase of chemical larvicide in addition to the huge amount for annual cleaning of canals and drains.

Earlier, the Comptroller and Auditor General office had raised objection against flushing drains with saline water as the corporation had spent '69.92 lakh for it without adequate documents and the authority of accounts couldn’t be ensured. Though the previous UDF council in 2012 had tried to introduce series of measures to bring down the recurring cost for mosquito control, it failed to succeed. The objective was to bring down the annual expense to Rs 20 to Rs 25 lakh.

The civic body formed a special anti-mosquito squad of 148 workers, with a daily wage of Rs 240, to make the drive more efficient. The introduction of handheld spraying machines, instead of the traditional fogging machines, mounted on auto rickshaws, also could not produce desired effect on the bills. The corporation also considered buying a Russian-made electro fogging machine worth US$2000 for mosquito control. But the health department didn’t approve the proposal.

In 2013, the civic body had purchased four big high-tech fogging machines and 20 small hand-held sprayers at a cost of Rs 1 lakh per big machine and Rs 30, 000 per small sprayer. But it proved to be a failure as the machines, with less smoke, are ineffective in eradicating mosquitoes. In 2012, Adv D. B. Binu, RTI activist, submitted RTI queries on mosquito eradication projects and the amount spent to which the civic body failed to respond.