Around 708 fresh cases of dengue were recorded in Delhi last week, suggested the weekly report released by South Delhi Municipal Corporation (SDMC) on Monday.
The report also suggested that 280 cases belonged to Delhi while 339 cases are from the neighbouring States and 89 remained untraced after investigation. With this, the total number of cases in November has crossed 1,000 mark.
Also, the total number of cases this year has risen to 4,913 out of which 1,875 belonged to Delhi while 2,528 belonged to neighbouring States and 509 remained untraced after investigation. The data includes one death reported in Wazirabad, North Delhi.
According to the report, the corporation has sprayed around 25, 29,108 houses. Around 2, 25,593 places were found positive for mosquito breeding out of which 1, 80,321 places were given legal notices. The prosecution has been launched in 25,570 cases so far. With more than 10,000, most of the prosecutions were launched in areas coming under SDMC. In North civic body, only 6588 prosecutions were launched and in East civic body, around 8000 prosecutions were launched.
Meanwhile taking precautionary measures, all the three corporations have already started a number of initiatives to prevent mosquito breeding, including creating awareness by using various media, deploying more dengue breeding checkers, and desilting of drains, the official said.
Concerned over increasing numbers of vector-borne diseases at the beginning of this year, South Delhi Municipal Corporation (SDMC) Commissioner Dr P K Goel had issued an advisory on prevention and control of vector-borne diseases in Delhi. Goel has called for prevention of mosquito breeding by source and made it clear that the reduction is the only effective tool for prevention and control of these diseases.
Last year, the number of dengue cases recorded in the national capital was as high as 8063 including 4188 of Delhi and 3875 of other States, the report stated. The numbers of malaria and chikungunya cases recorded in 2017 stood at 1,106 and 855 respectively.
Considering this, doctors in the city are busy suggesting different precautionary measures to people. Doctors have advised people to wear full sleeves clothes and avoid mosquito prone areas.
Dengue and chikungunya are caused by the Aedes Aegypti mosquito, which breeds in clean water. The female Anopheles mosquito, which causes malaria, breeds in both clean and muddy water.
