5 deaths in 8 days: Dengue takes a worse turn in Ctg

Chattogram is now witnessing an outbreak of the dengue virus as the authorities reported five deaths, including two children, in just eight days until 23 June.

With the latest addition, the number of deaths from the mosquito-borne viral infection stood at 8 so far in 2023. The other three were reported in January.

According to the authorities, some 30 patients with dengue fever were admitted to various hospitals of Chattogram in the past 24 hours until Friday morning, which is the single day highest this year.

Of the patients, 17 patients are admitted to Chattogram Medical College and Hospital, one to the Chattogram General Hospital and 12 to different private hospitals.

Public health experts fear that ongoing intermittent rains and sacrificial animal waste during Eid-ul-Adha can worsen the dengue situation further.

"Two months ago, we warned agencies concerned about the possible surge in dengue cases. I also wrote to the city corporation to take action, but nothing has been done. Now the situation is deteriorating," said Mohammad Ilias Chowdhury, civil surgeon for Chattogram.

Many people can leave their city homes untidy and unclean while leaving for village homes on the upcoming Eid and there will also be a lot of waste from sacrificial animals. All can contribute to a further rise in dengue cases, he told The Business Standard.

Data from the Chattogram Civil Surgeon office shows that 188 people with dengue fever were admitted to the hospital in the first 22 days of this month. The number of dengue patients admitted to hospitals has totalled 370 when it comes to the January to June data.

Dengue-infected patients in hospitals were 36 in the first half of 2022, zero in 2021 and 11 in 2020.

What does the city corporation do?

The port city saw 5,445 dengue infections with dengue and 41 of them died last year.

The district civil surgeon's office and civil society people repeatedly called for mosquito eradication programmes immediately after the death of three in the Chattogram City Corporation area in January this year. Yet, the corporation did not pay heed to experts.

As the number of dengue patients started to rise again, the corporation took a crash program for all 41 wards, commencing Thursday, to kill mosquitoes. City dwellers, however, expressed doubts about whether such crash programmes will yield any fruit at all.

"It is not possible to control diseases like dengue with a 100-day crash programme," said Abdul Latif, a resident of the city's Chawkbazar area.

"Even there is no success in mosquito-killing programmes funded by the government because the staffers involved have a tendency of finishing work without making any cordial efforts," he told The Business Standard.

The Chattogram City Corporation says it spent Tk3.5 crore to control dengue in the last five years. The spending, however, is one-fifth of the allocations. Manpower shortage is blamed for the utilisation of the allocations.

Mubarak Ali, president of the Chattogram City Corporation Waste Management Standing Committee, said, "We have a shortage of manpower as well as effective mosquito-killing drugs."

"The result of the insecticide which we used so far is not satisfactory. Now, we have collected new medicine from the Bangladesh Air Force, on the advice of the Chattogram University researchers. It will be sprayed in 57 spots of 41 wards," he told TBS.

Experts say the proper application of effective drugs is crucial to control mosquitoes. At the same time, emphasis should be given to spraying time and methods.