Japanese Encephalitis toll touch 166

Gorakhpur, Sep 17 (UNI) The fatal Japanese Encephalitis (JE) continues to haunt Uttar Pradesh as the toll mounted to 166 with the death of five children here during the last 24 hrs.

Joint director health Dr Umakant Prasad today said the inflow of patients continued unabated at the Baba Raghav Das Medical College, which has become the centre of JE menace.

Since April this year, 977 people -- including 13 fresh cases -- sufferring from JE have been admitted at the medical college, of which 107 are still under treatment. So far, JE has killed 166 people.

Last year, JE had claimed more than 1,000 lives in UP.

The patients hail from Gorakhpur, Deoria, Maharajganj, Sant Kabirnagar, Kushinagar, Basti, Siddharthnagar, Azamgarh, Gonda and Balrampur districts of UP. Some cases also pertain to the adjoining districts of Bihar.

The endemic afflicts Eastern UP during monsoon every year.

Sources said Japanese Encephalitis is found throughout rural areas in Asia, while transmission can also occur near urban areas in some developing Asian countries.

The disease has a complex life cycle involving domestic pigs and a specific type of mosquito that lives in rural rice growing and pig-farming regions.The mosquito breeds in flooded rice fields, marshes and standing water around planted fields.

The virus can infect humans, domestic animals, birds, snakes and frogs.After infection, the virus invades the central nervous system, including brain.

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