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Friday, July 29, 2011

India : Govt sounds disease alert

Via The Telegraph :

" Jorhat, July 28: The Assam government has alerted all 27 districts to take precautionary measures against the possible outbreak of dengue and chikungunya, both vector-borne viral diseases.

There have been over 140 encephalitis-related deaths in 15 districts of the state, with about 42 confirmed Japanese encephalitis deaths. Over 610 people were suffering from the disease till date this year.

Joint director of health services (malaria), also the programme officer of National Vector Borne Disease Control Programme, A.K. Goswami, in a circular to all districts recently, asked the authorities to prepare a plan for prevention and control of dengue and chikungunya.

The circular said in view of the fact that last year, there were 237 cases of confirmed dengue cases with two casualties, precautionary steps should be taken immediately. This year, there have been no reported cases of dengue or chikungunya so far.

The circular said the main strategy for dengue or chikungunya control was source reduction of vector mosquitoes and steps should be taken in this regard.

It asked the joint directors of health services in all the districts to involve other agencies like urban development, panchayati raj and public health engineering, in addition to the health department, to carry out drives for the source reduction."

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