City grapples with spurt in dengue cases
A patient suffering from dengue fever sits under a mosquito net inside a dengue and malaria ward at the Sindh Government Services Hospital in Karachi September 21, 2022. PHOTO: REUTERS
While a spurt in dengue cases appears to have overwhelmed hospitals in Karachi, health officials confirmed first death from the vector-borne disease in Hyderabad on Thursday night when a 19-year-old died at the Civil Hospital.
Karachi saw highest single-day count of dengue cases of 218 on Thursday as the number of cases in the city reached 5,492 so far this month, and 6,268 for the whole year.
The highest count of dengue cases, 76, was reported from East district followed by 72 in Central, 23 in South, 20 in Korangi, 12 in Malir, eight in Keamari, and seven in West.
Medical experts have warned citizens that papaya leaf extract increases the risk of diarrhoea which further causes weakness. Affected people should drink water and fruit juice, they said.
Though floodwater is receding in parts of Sindh, many parts of the province are still swamped which provides breeding grounds for mosquitoes. Hence, malaria and dengue, both mosquito-borne aliments, have broken out there.
Over 6,000 cases of dengue, including 31 deaths, and 12,210 of malaria have surfaced in the province in the last two months, according to a report of the Sindh Health Department.
The department’s statistics, however, show that the dengue outbreak has been mostly confined to Karachi where all the dengue-caused deaths have happened except one in Hyderabad.
Some 289 dengue cases surfaced in six districts of Hyderabad division, 277 in Mirpurkhas, 45 in Nawabshah, 35 in Sukkur and 25 in Larkana divisions. Like Karachi, a majority of the patients reported with dengue symptoms in those five divisions in September.
Some 6,535 fixed camps and 7,322 mobile camps, providing health services to the rain and flood displaced people, screened 251,587 patients having symptoms typical of malaria. However, only 12,210 among them tested positive.
The department claims that more than 2.79 million patients have been treated at the camps over the last two months. The department’s camps treated 1.851 million patients and those of the Peoples Primary Healthcare Initiative (PPHI) 942,284 patients.
On September 20 alone, some 78,242 patients were examined. An overwhelming majority of the patients treated at the camps suffered from skin diseases because people either have to wade through or use floodwater. The number of such patients has been recorded at 636,729.
Another 577,286 patients, mostly children, were treated for diarrhea. In the month of August, 99,629 children of less than five years of age and 102,395 children of above five years of age were treated for watery diarrhea.
Likewise, 8,873 children of less than five years of age and 11,311 of over five years were attended at the medical camps in August and 5,303 and 6,922, respectively, in September.
The medical camps also registered 688 dog-bite and 134 snake-bite cases. The department claims that they have a stock of 86,021 rabies vaccines and 16,554 anti-snake venom doses. The rains and flood caused partial damage to 917 buildings of the health department besides destroying 165 health facilities, including 299 in Hyderabad, 259 in Mirpurkhas, 196 in Nawabshah, 194 in Larkana, and 128 in Sukkur divisions.
Published in The Express Tribune, September 24th, 2022.