DAVAO CITY (MindaNews/19 Aug) — The City Health Office (CHO) reported that the dengue cases in the city has slowly dropped due to intensive preventive measures.
Dr. Josephine Villafuerte, the city health officer, told reporters that they have monitored the drop of dengue incidence in the last week of July.
Based on CHO records, dengue incidence dropped from 417 last June to 322 as of last week of July. The dengue incidence reached as high as 441 last January but drastically dropped to 104 in May, then surged again the following month.
Forty-one people already died within the seven-month period, she added. Nineteen of these fatalities were recorded in July and eight in June .
Villafuerte disclosed that this city ranked third all over the country for having recorded about 3,000 dengue cases from January to July.
But she believes that some of the dengue patients may not all come from this city but from nearby provinces. “They were just brought here because of accessibility to our hospitals,” the health official said.
Records also showed that the Buhangin district of this city has the most number of dengue cases with 306, followed by Talomo North (211), Talomo South (201), Agdao District (110) and Toril Districts A and B with 90 and 95 respectively.
In 2009, the CHO recorded 4,487 dengue incidence, a total of 566 of these were recorded in October, just two cases higher in the previous month.
Meanwhile, Villafuerte said that the bromeliad ornamental plant is among the top natural breeding grounds of the Aegis aegypti mosquito, the species carrying dengue.
Aside from bromeliad, she also cited bamboo plants because its open stems can hold water and serve as breeding ground.
“Some empty containers and tires can be breeding grounds, too, if these are not stored properly and start to collect water,” she said. (Keith Bacongco / MindaNews)