'Field hospitals' may be needed for dengue sufferers

'Field hospitals' may be needed for dengue sufferers

JAKARTA (JP): Jakarta administration will build "temporary
field hospitals" if existing facilities can no longer treat the
growing number of people infected with dengue fever, an official
said yesterday.

Deputy Governor for Social Welfare Affairs Djailani said the
number of dengue fever sufferers admitted to hospitals and health
centers increased by an average of 200 people per day.

He said the field hospital concept would be realized by the
administration in conjunction with the Armed Forces on vacant
land surrounding hospital complexes.

"The Armed Forces will provide tents, mattresses, (health)
equipment and also manpower.

"However, such hospitals will be built only if hospitals and
health centers really cannot accommodate patients. We have urged
hospitals to 'improvise' so that patients can be treated along
the hospitals' corridors or any other available spaces.

"The field hospitals are the last option," he told reporters
after launching a mass movement for eradicating the habitat of
Aedes aegypti mosquitoes, the carriers of the dengue fever virus.

Djailani said the administration hoped that residents would
participate in the mass movement not only once but every Sunday
so "the peak of the outbreak predicted to take place in May or
June won't be realized".

"So don't give the mosquitoes a chance to lay their eggs, let
alone breed."

Patients

At state-owned Persahabatan Hospital, in East Jakarta, no
rooms were available yesterday but 10 new patients were being
treated in the emergency room. Patients are temporarily
accommodated in the hospitals' corridors rather than turned away.

A couple were seen rushing their baby to the emergency room as
soon as medical staff at a clinic in East Jakarta declared that
the infant, Ardian, had been infected.

"The clinic recommended that Ardian be treated here," Diana,
the mother, said.

About 10 people from her neighborhood in Cakung, East Jakarta,
had been infected.

"The neighborhood has not been fumigated yet," she said.

After learning that no more rooms were available for her 10-
month-old baby, she said: "I don't care if Ardian is treated in
corridors or wherever, what's important is that he is saved."

More than 10 people waited at a counter for their relatives'
blood test results yesterday. One woman was forced to wait for
three hours for the results, while others waited for up to two
hours.

"You see... if there is only one staff member to serve us,
how can we get the result immediately?" one patient said.

In the children's wards, so many patients were being treated
in the corridors that it was no longer easy to pass by. Some
children were also treated in the adult wards.

Ernawati, the mother of a nine-year-old patient, Nurdiansyah,
who is being treated in one of the hospital's corridors, said: "I
know that all hospitals are full of dengue fever patients.

"I hope that the tariffs will be cheaper than being treated in
the rooms," she said while fanning Nurdiansyah, who was laying
down on a mattress.

There was a similar sight at the Indonesian Christian
University's hospital in East Jakarta and other hospitals
throughout the city.

To cope with the lack of rooms, the city administration
donated last week 30 mattresses to the hospital.

Governor Sutiyoso promised Friday that the administration
would send mattresses to hospitals which had no more rooms to
treat dengue fever patients.

The administration received 300 mattresses from Jakarta
Military Command and another 350 from National Police
Headquarters last week.

The number of people affected by the fever this year climbed
to 5,860 as of Friday, with the city's death toll reaching 54.

Head of the City Health Agency Aslan Lasman urged public
health centers not to be too bureaucratic in their distributing
of Abate powder, which is used to stem the Aedes aegypti
mosquitoes's life cycle.

"The powder should be distributed freely to people who need
it, don't be too bureaucratic. But people should be informed that
the powder should only be spread in places which are routinely
cleaned." (ind)