Serious drives fail to curb dengue cases

Serious drives fail to curb dengue cases

JAKARTA (JP): Despite serious efforts and drives to curb
dengue fever, 7,081 dengue cases were recorded in the city last
year, an official said.

Aslan Lasman, the head of the city's health agency, said
yesterday that the number was much higher than the estimated
3,700 to 4,000 cases.

"The estimation was made based on observations over a three-
year period. But the prediction was right off," he said.

"Last year's number of cases was higher than that in 1995,
when there was only 5,867 cases," Aslan said in his report to the
governor.

Aslan said dengue outbreaks happened in 1992, 1994, 1995 and
1996 in the capital city. Newspapers reported that 18 people had
died of dengue from January to May 1996.

Dengue is considered common in the city, with one or more
cases being found in 259 out of 265 subdistricts in three
consecutive years.

He said most districts in the city, except Kepulauan Seribu
district, were vulnerable to dengue.

"In 1996, the number of dengue cases increased between April
and June, especially in East Jakarta," Aslan said.

His office had officially asked the Ministry of Health to
conduct research on dengue in East Jakarta. "We got no response,"
he said.

Last year, most dengue cases in the city happened in May and
June, with 1,349 and 1,098 cases respectively.

"The lowest number was reported in October, with 246 cases,"
Aslan said.

In November and December, cases increased to 508 and 759
respectively, he said.

"In January this year, the number of dengue cases dropped to
502 and it was only 185 in February," Aslan said.

Governor Surjadi Soedirdja said Thursday the city had tried
several ways to curb the deadly disease.

Fumigation in locations where the aedes aegypti mosquito is
known to breed, as well as providing adequate information on how
to prevent the spread of the disease were still popular.

Surjadi said dengue was a unique disease in that the aedes
aegypti mosquito carrying it lays eggs in clear and stagnant
water.

Those infected usually experience high fever, rash and
hemorrhaging.

Aslan did not mention the number of people who died of dengue
fever last year.

The city's information department had tried to block all
information on the spread of the illness in fear of a drop in the
number of tourists.

Asked about City Hall's effort to block such information, the
Ministry of Health's Director General of Communicable Disease
Control and Environmental Health Hadi M. Abednego said yesterday:
"It is understandable. Maybe if City Hall could make scientific
reports on the disease, there would be no problem," he told The
Jakarta Post.

He said the most important step was to spread the right
information of how to prevent the spread of dengue and for the
public to take necessary precautions.

"Three main efforts to prevent dengue are: cleaning out any
water containers at least once a week, closing all water
containers and burying containers of standing water like old
cans, which could be used by the mosquitoes to breed," Hadi said.

He said the efforts sound very simple, but require a change in
habits.

Data at the Ministry of Health indicated that as of June 17,
1996, 43 had died of dengue fever and 3,024 others had been
hospitalized. In May there were 28 deaths out of 1,880 cases, the
ministry said. (ste)