Districts to get more to fight dengue
Districts to get more to fight dengue
Bambang Nurbianto, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Starting next year, district administrations in Jakarta will be
playing a greater role in the fight against dengue, which kills
dozens of Jakarta people every year.
The City Council's health commission approved an allocation of
Rp 200 million (US$20,000) for each of the 44 districts in next
year's budget over the weekend.
Commission chairman Dani Anwar said that the money would be
distributed to the community health center in each district so
that they could take immediate action to curb the spread of the
fatal disease.
"With the allocation of this money next year, we hope that the
community health centers will be able to act quickly to prevent
the spread of the disease," he said after deliberations on the
budget with officials from the Jakarta Health Agency.
"The main activities to be paid for with the money are
fumigation and the provision of abate powder," added Dani, a
councillor from the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS).
In its budget estimates, the city administration proposes to
allocate Rp 800 billion for the health sector in 2006 compared to
Rp 600 billion this year.
The health agency proposed the allocation of Rp 200 billion
for the provision of health services to the poor, free treatment
for dengue fever patients, the renovation of buildings and
routine spending.
Currently, the city is encouraging people to spend 30 minutes
eliminating mosquito breeding places every Friday from 9 a.m. to
9.30 a.m. However, there has been a meager public response to
date.
According to Dani, the Rp 200 million for community health
centers in each district was not the only money being allocated
to fight dengue fever in the capital as each subdistrict also
received funding for its own health programs.
He was referring to the Rp 1.7 billion distributed to each
subdistrict for the provision of better public services,
including measures to curb the spread of contagious diseases such
as bird flu and dengue fever.