The state health department has started bracing itself to deal with diseases like dengue and malaria.

On Monday, a meeting of vector borne diseases officers of all the districts was held at the office of Director General (DG) health services. Addressing the meeting, the director of National Health Mission (NHM), Dr Anjali Nautiyal said that in view of their past experiences, they should prepare an effective strategy to deal with the diseases.

She emphasized the need to take the services of private hospitals and practitioners in the campaign against malaria and dengue and said that the reporting of the patients directly getting admitted in private hospitals is done compulsorily.  Dr Nautiyal said that the district vector borne diseases officers should convene meetings with the Indian Medical Association, private pathology labs and Registered Medical Practitioners to provide information about the treatment and standards to be followed for these diseases.

The director of medical health, Dr Amita Upreti said that it is essential to keep the diseases like Dengue and Malaria at bay to ensure that the health services are stable in the state. She also emphasised a need of strong and effective strategy of prevention and control of these vector borne diseases.

The state programme officer of the vector borne diseases, Dr Pankaj Singh gave a detailed account about these diseases and prevention mechanism. He suggested that employees of NHM should be pressed into service in this campaign so that there is no problem of manpower. 

In the meeting, it was concluded that dissemination  of information and awareness holds key for prevention of dengue and malaria. The officials also informed about the importance of Dengue- Chikungunya awareness card for school children.

 It is worth mentioning here that the Indian Education Council ( IEC) has devised this card in which the children are asked to identify the breeding grounds of mosquitoes in their home assignments and mention them in the cards.

 The meeting was also attended by the officers of health department and NHM.