Dengue cases down: Health secretary J Radhakrishnan

Chennai: Incidence of dengue has started showing a decline in a majority of Tamil Nadu districts due to coordinated efforts by all departments of the government. However, there are still challenges to overcome in Madurai, Tirunelveli and Tiruchy regions due to various factors, health secretary J.Radhakrishnan said on Sunday.

Speaking to reporters after inspecting the government hospital in Nagapattinam, the top official put the death toll due to dengue since the beginning of the year at 52, while attributing another 80 deaths due to various seasonal fevers in the State. He said mass cleaning activities have been given “greater impetus” due to which the number of people being affected by the deadly dengue has come down.
 
“Generally, the fever has started showing decline in most districts of the state, but there are still challenges in Madurai, Tirunelveli and Tiruchy regions apart from metropolis Chennai. We are working on reducing the incidence of dengue in these regions as well”, Radhakrishnan said, adding that all district collectors have been asked to inspect hospitals to check whether patients are being treated properly.
 
“Since the beginning of the year, 142 people have died due to various fevers across the state of which 52 are due to dengue. The situation has been brought under control and the incidence of the disease is also down. We request people not to panic”, Radhakrishnan said.    

He also said the government was taking all precautionary measures to ensure that other fevers like malaria do not spread with the onset of the monsoon on Sunday. 

“We have kept medicines on stock and there will be no problem with regard to prevention of such diseases. Already, mass cleaning activities have begun across the state,” Radhakrishnan said.

“We have made it clear to private hospitals that they should not admit patients with less than 50,000 platelet count,” a senior official said.

Radhakrishnan also said people have participated in large numbers in cleaning the vacant lands in several areas and asserted that the focus was to highlight the cause management by involving people in a “massive way.” The health secretary said all district collectors are in close coordination with workers on the field in controlling dengue.

However, field workers in several districts said the situation has been brought under control but top officials like district collectors should review the progress from their office instead of conducting inspections the whole day. “Collectors should not harp on inspections the whole day. Inspecting hospitals once in a while is fine, but if the Collector continues with inspections every day, crucial time is being wasted since the entire machinery goes behind the officer the whole day”, an official, who is coordinating efforts on the field, said on condition of anonymity.

Another officer also said the district authorities should desist from imposing spot fines on private organisations for “flouting rules by making their land dengue breeding grounds. It should be left to officials of the department concerned. Spot fine is becoming a fashion and top-ranking officials of the district should desist from making their spot visits a media spectacle”, the official said.

Though fever cases have come down, a lot needs to be done by the civic authorities to prevent spread of the disease, field workers said. Civic bodies still turn blind eyes to sludge and garbage at various locations allowing them to become major breeding ground for mosquitoes.