Spurt in dengue cases due to poor public response: Monga

New Delhi, Sep 8 (UNI) While admitting a spurt in dengue cases in Delhi this year, Chairman of the Health Committee in the Municipal Corporation of Delhi V K Monga today said it was the poor public response to the anti-dengue drive that had led to a sharp increase in the number of dengue cases in the city.

Speaking during a short discussion on dengue at a meeting of the MCD House, Dr Monga said there had been no let-up on the part of the MCD in terms of its preparedness.

''If anything, the MCD this year has been better prepared compared to previous years, to tackle dengue. However, factors like early rain, sharp rise in humidity and the temperature remaining low have contributed to increased breeding levels of the dengue larvae.

Also, the poor public response to the anti-Dengue measures has not helped. Even after repeated visits by our staffers to various localities to urge adoption of measures to check Dengue, the breeding levels still continued to remain high,''Dr Monga said.

He said the MCD had been taking all possible measures to tackle spread of the dengue virus, including setting up ten platelet centres in Delhi, rapid response vehicles and carrying out widespread publicity campaigns through FM radio and through pamphlets.

Further, Chemyphone granules have been made available in large numbers.

Speaking during the discussion, members of the Congress alleged that the MCD administration was presenting false figures to the public on the spread of dengue.

In this context, Mr Farhad Suri said the MCD had been saying there has been one death from Delhi due to the Dengue virus whereas there had already been three cases of dengue in Delhi - one in January and two others in March.

Leader of the Opposition in the MCD Jai Kishen Sharma alleged that in a bid to bring down figures of those suffering from Dengue in Delhi, the MCD was wrongly passing off the patients from Delhi as being from neighbouring states.

''Any additional case of Dengue from Delhi is being passed off as being from either Uttar Pradesh or Haryana,''Mr Sharma said.

According to the MCD, a total of 142 cases of dengue had come to light in Delhi till now.

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