Schools dig deep into pockets to fight dengue
Schools dig deep into pockets to fight dengue
The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Spending 15 minutes to sweep classrooms and schoolyards, cleaning
toilets before classes start every Friday morning, is not a
burden for students of State Junior High School 103 in Cijantung,
East Jakarta.
"The school has been encouraging us to do these activities
since December 2004 to make the PSN (the city's campaign against
dengue) a success. It is okay with us, but it makes us a little
bit tired," third grader Pudi told The Jakarta Post on Saturday.
The city administration has declared 84 subdistricts in the
capital as dengue-infected areas, including Cijantung, Cawang and
Lubang Buaya in East Jakarta, Karet Tengsin in Central Jakarta,
Rawa Badak in North Jakarta, and Cilandak in South Jakarta.
To contain the fever, which has infected some 1,700 people and
claimed 17 lives, the city administration appealed to the public
to clean bathroom water tubs once a week, cover water containers,
and bury any unused items that could hold water.
The administration has also enlisted the services of hundreds
of nursing students from 40 medical and nursing schools in the
capital to take part in awareness campaigns.
To help dengue patients, the city administration has set aside
Rp 1.5 billion to pay medical bills incurred in third-class-wards
of 17 public hospitals and 58 non-government hospitals, conducted
simultaneous blanket fumigation, and run campaigns to raise
people's awareness of the dangers of dengue fever.
Pudi said they also sprayed insecticide in their classrooms.
"This is the first time the school has done this. Last year,
when a similar outbreak occurred, we weren't told to do the
clean-ups. The school was only fumigated," she added.
The school's deputy headmaster Dachri Suraatmadja said since
the beginning of this year's outbreak, no health official from
the district or subdistrict has come to fumigate the school area.
"No official has come to fumigate the school or inform of the
action needed to contain the outbreak, but we were ordered by
Governor Sutiyoso to allocate some funds for the anti-dengue
campaign," said Dachri.
"We have spent around Rp 6 million of the Rp 22,500,000
allocated to the school's health unit, and it has only been four
Fridays," the school's treasurer Kusnadi told the Post.
The funds were used to cover operational costs of the anti-
dengue campaign, including buying insecticide sprays and cleaning
supplies.
A health teacher at a state elementary school in Baru
subdistrict in Pasar Rebo, East Jakarta, also said that the
school has taken funds from the health unit budget to cover the
cost of cleaning operations and educating the students about the
dangers of dengue fever.
The teacher said that teaching elementary school students
about dengue and how to prevent it was not easy, especially to
first, second and third graders.
"We have to use audiovisual aids to help the students
understand," he said. (001)