Malaria prevalent in many villages

Malaria prevalent in many villages

JAKARTA (JP): Malaria incidents have been declining in
Indonesia and are now confined mostly to villages, health
officials said yesterday.

"Currently, malaria is still found in 32 regencies in Java and
Bali, and in 118 regencies on the outer islands," the director
general for contagious disease control and settlement and
environmental sanitation, Hadi M. Abednego, said at a seminar.

"Indonesian cities and towns are already free of the epidemic,
with the exception of the outskirts of some eastern Indonesian
towns like Jayapura, Sorong, Dili, Ambon and Kendari," he said in
the seminar to review progress of the country's efforts to fight
malaria.

A joint team from the Ministry of Health and the World Health
Organization, in a joint study, found that the number of people
who were reported to have malaria in Indonesia declined from 7.59
million in 1993 to 4.26 million in 1995.

The study, which was presented at the seminar, distinguished
between Java and Bali on one hand, and less-developed outer
islands on the other.

In Java and Bali, the number of villages where there were
incidents of malaria had not declined but the number of patients
dwindled from 19 per 100,000 people in 1993 to six per 100,000 in
1995.

The report noted exceptional outbreaks of malaria in Nusa
Penida in Bali in 1994, Jepara in Central Java in 1996 and this
year, and in Tasikmalaya in West Java in 1996.

Areas most prone to malaria in Java and Bali were the southern
coast of Java, areas bordering forests and hills, and rice
fields.

On the outer islands, malaria cases were found at new
settlement areas. Malaria incidents remain higher on the outer
islands although the rate has declined from 2,051 per 100,000
people in 1993 to 1,913 in 1995, the report said. (09)