If the health officials would have it their way, fighting dengue should be as easy as ABKD—or through “Aksyon Barangay Kontra Dengue.”
ABKD (Abakada) was launched Thursday by a threefold partnership between the Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG), the Department of Health (DoH) and the Department of Science and Technology (DoST) in Barangay (village) Bagbag, Quezon City.
Bagbag is one of the communities that registered the most number of dengue cases in Metro Manila.
Interior Secretary Jesse Robredo brought the antidengue drive down to the barangay and school level, prompting the use of mist-spraying, deployment of ovi-larvicidal traps to kill the mosquitos and cleanup operations.
“Combating dengue requires everyone’s cooperation. We need to do our part in fighting this threat,” said Health Secretary Enrique Ona.
Ona added that the increasing number of dengue cases was seen as an international problem with dengue hits also rising in neighboring countries, but said this requires a local, even grassroot-level, solution.
Back to basics
ABKD is set to reinforce the country’s drive against dengue by “going back to basics,” added Ona. He said the campaign seeks to urge families, village leaders and youth councils to take the lead and “aggressively search and destroy” the possible mosquito breeding sites every week. The campaign is seen to be carried out until October, when cases are expected to fall.
Ona also asked residents to remember the 4 S’s—Search and destroy mosquito breeding sites, Self-protection by wearing long-sleeved shirts, Seek early advice at the nearest health center and Say yes to fogging only when there is an impending outbreak in hot spots.
Ona also said that ovi-larvicidal traps that are now used to kill mosquitos will also be used as “indicator” to monitor a community’s “dengue situation.”
Science Secretary Mario Montojo said the DoST is set to deploy enough anti-mosquito traps to all schools across the country by the second week of September.
Ona added that DILG and DoH are coming up with guidelines on how to use the results of the traps as basis for declaring an area to be a hot spot. Communities with severe cases, such as Barangay Bagbag, are allowed to use their calamity fund for anti-dengue drive.
Significantly lower
The Department of Health has recorded 321 deaths across the country from January 1 to August 20 this year, which is lower than last year’s tally of 517 cases. The cases in Metro Manila contributed to 23 percent of the nationwide figure. Metro Manila contributed 12,571 cases, where at least 22 barangays have been identified as “dengue hot spots,” most of them in Quezon City.
But DoH was quick to say that the 56,005 dengue cases nationwide so far this year are significantly lower than the 74,028 hits during the same period last year.
Quezon City listed 3,948 cases as of the same period, with District 1 accounting for 546, District 2 had 1,508, District 2A had 1,024, District 3 had 426, and District 4 had 444 cases.
Bagbag registered the most number of dengue hits with 227 and one death, while Barangay Batasan Hills had the most number of deaths at four.
In general, most cities cited an increase in dengue cases. Pasig posted the greatest jump of cases with 716 this year compared with 181 incidents last year, or an increase of 296 percent. Taguig had a 290 percent increase from 123 to 480 cases, while Las Piñas had a 192 percent hike from 113 to 330 cases. Quezon City had 120-percent hike with 3,553 cases this year compared with 1,618 last year.