Civic health officials to track dengue and malaria cases similar to Covid

Mumbai's Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) is tracking dengue and malaria patients to curb the rise in cases, following the model used for Covid-19 patients. The city has already seen a significant number of dengue cases before the monsoon season, with 353 cases recorded in June alone, a nine-fold increase from last year. The BMC has activated 24 war rooms to monitor and provide assistance to patients, and a house-to-house survey is being conducted for malaria detection. Diagnostic tests at BMC dispensaries have also been made free of charge.

Mumbai: In order to curb the rise in dengue and malaria cases, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has decided to follow up on each dengue and malaria patients like the way Covid-19 patients were tracked.

HT Image

This year, even before the start of the monsoon, the city has seen a significant number of dengue cases. In June alone, the city recorded 353 dengue cases, a nine-fold rise from June 2022 numbers.

“We have activated the 24 Covid-19 war rooms. Each ward has one war room with a doctor, the coordinator who has a social worker background and a data entry operator working in two shifts,” said Dr Daksha Shah, executive health officer, BMC.

She added the war rooms will be getting details of dengue and malaria patients from their wards on a daily basis. “We receive the case file and details. The war room’s duty is to call and check if the patient needs any help, if they are taking medicines. For example, malaria treatment has to be taken for 14 days. The team will remind the patient about it,” said Dr Shah.

Doctors said the city has been witnessing a significant number of dengue cases much earlier than it normally does. Doctors said generally, dengue, a viral infection that spreads from the bite of aedes aegypti, the yellow fever mosquito, cases are seen a month after the onset of monsoon.

According to the BMC data, the city has already recorded 445 dengue cases to date. In 2022, the city had seen 1,123 cases and in 2021 there were 876 cases. The dengue cases in 2020 and 2019 were 129 and 919 respectively.

BMC has also implemented a malaria detection campaign where if a malaria case is detected in an area, a house-to-house survey will be done of 250 houses around it. BMC health officials said their team will immediately send blood samples of anyone found to be having a fever in their house-to-house survey. “If found positive, the person will be put on treatment,” said Dr Shah.

Meanwhile, the BMC has decided to make diagnostic tests at its dispensaries free of cost. Earlier, ₹50 was charged for diagnostic tests.