Uttarakhand: Dengue outbreak sweeps through Dehradun, prompting urgent action
The Raipur area of Dehradun has been engulfed by a concerning dengue fever outbreak, with reports indicating that it has become a major hotspot for the disease.
An alarming number of residents in every household within the Raipur area are grappling with dengue-related symptoms, and the situation has escalated to over 500 confirmed dengue cases in this locality alone.
Pediatricians report that 10% to 20% of dengue patients are now requiring hospitalization. Dr. Rajath Athreya, a pediatrician and member of the state’s Covid Technical Advisory Committee, notes that this includes admissions to the ICU.
In the South zone, which saw the highest number of cases in August, the BBMP (Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike) has implemented a schedule to ensure source reduction activities are carried out in all types of localities, not just slums.
Dengue cases, which reached their peak in July, have not shown a significant decrease in Bengaluru, according to doctors.
Pediatricians report that 10 per cent to 20 per cent of dengue patients are now requiring hospitalization. Dr. Rajath Athreya, a pediatrician and member of the state’s Covid Technical Advisory Committee, notes that this includes admissions to the ICU.
The number of dengue cases in Kolkata has doubled in about a fortnight, figures shared by some officials of the Kolkata Municipal Corporation over the last month have shown.
There has been a corresponding rise in hospital admissions too, senior officials and doctors of private healthcare units in Kolkata said.
A KMC official said on Saturday that till the last count, about 1,400 dengue infections have been reported since January. KMC updates the number of dengue infections in the city every Thursday.
The Telegraph had reported earlier that about 700 dengue cases were reported till the second week of August.
Neither the KMC nor the state health department released any official data on the number of dengue infections, but some officials shared with The Telegraph the number of dengue infections on condition of anonymity. There is no official data on the number of people who have died of dengue, but several deaths from dengue have come to light.
KMC officials admitted on Saturday and Sunday that the numbers have seen a sharp rise in the last two weeks.
“We are going door-to-door telling people that they should not allow water to accumulate anywhere in their house. We are also detecting and destroying sites for mosquito breeding. We are also cleaning abandoned vacant plots as they turn into sites for mosquito breeding,” said a KMC official.
Mumbai: The doctor, treating the teenager, said he could have been saved if medical help had been sought a bit earlier. (Representative Image)
A14-year-old boy from Mumbai’s Kurla has died after being simultaneously infected with dengue, malaria and leptospirosis. A shocking detail was revealed in his medical history that despite being affected by three monsoon ailments, the boy had sought treatment from a local faith healer for nearly a week before approaching a hospital.
According to a report in Times of India, the teenager from Kurla (west) sought medical attention at Kasturba Hospital on August 14 with fever and jaundice when his situation did not improve after ‘treatment’ from faith healer.
At Kasturba, a dengue NS1 test came positive, as did a malaria test. To the surprise of the medical team, an additional test confirmed he also had leptospirosis, the report stated.
The 14-year-old’s condition started deteriorating as his creatinine levels rose and he developed breathing difficulties. Soon after he was shifted to Nair Hospital in Mumbai Central, where he succumbed in ICU.
All the three monsoon ailments — malaria, dengue and leptospirosis — led to an acute respiratory distress. The boy was also placed on a ventilator in BYL Nair Hospital but he passed away in three days.
The TOI report quoted Dr Girish Rajadhyaksha, professor and unit head of medicine, as saying that they not only tried to manage his raging symptoms and multi-organ failure but also initiated treatment to combat the infections.
According to the information received from the Health Department, Dehradun has the maximum number of four-hundred and eighteen (418) dengue patients while the toll in the entire state stands at six hundred (600)
Haridwar, Udham Singh Nagar and Dehradun districts of the state are the most affected by dengue. File (For Representational purpose only) | Photo Credit: ANI
After nature’s havoc in Uttarakhand, dengue cases are now creating fear among the people as the state has crossed six hundred cases of the mosquito-borne viral disease.
According to the information received from the Health Department, Dehradun has the maximum number of four-hundred and eighteen (418) dengue patients while the toll in the entire state stands at six hundred (600).
Haridwar, Udham Singh Nagar and Dehradun districts of the state are the most affected by dengue. In the aftermath of recent heavy monsoon floods that inundated parts of Uttarakhand, health officials are grappling with a significant surge in dengue cases.
Dengue (break-bone fever) is a viral infection that spreads from mosquitoes to people.Waterlogging in areas due to incessant rains has caused a preferable environment for Aedes mosquitoes to breed. These mosquitoes are responsible for transmitting dengue, chikungunya, and Zika viruses.
August has proved to be the worst-ever month in the history of dengue in Bangladesh, with 60,352 cases of the vector-borne disease recorded, Dhaka Tribune reported.
August has proved to be the worst-ever month in the history of dengue in Bangladesh, with 60,352 cases of the vector-borne disease recorded, Dhaka Tribune reported.
Dengue cases are not likely to ebb anytime soon, the report noted, adding that in August alone, the country witnessed more deaths than the overall toll recorded last year.
This month, Bangladesh has seen 286 dengue deaths, the Tribune reported, adding that the toll translates to 10 deaths and 2,321 cases on an average daily in the last 26 days.
The grim figures come as nine more dengue deaths – five of them in Dhaka alone – were reported in a span of 24 hours till Saturday morning, raising the number of fatalities from the mosquito-borne disease to 537 this year, according to Dhaka Tribune.
During the same period, 1,960 more patients were hospitalised with viral fever, according to the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS).
Of the new patients, 833 were admitted to hospitals in Dhaka and the rest outside the capital, indicating a worsening situation across the country, said the DGHS.
A total of 8,232 dengue patients, including 3,846 in the capital, are now receiving treatment at hospitals across the country.
The most recent data from WHO highlights China’s emergence as a major concern. In the last three months alone, China has documented 315 confirmed mpox cases.
Image: AP
In recent months, China has been grappling with a surge in cases of mpox, a disease previously known as monkeypox, earning the unenviable title of the world’s fastest-growing outbreak, according to a recent report by the World Health Organization (WHO). The agency is urging swift action from China to curb the spread of the disease.
While parts of the Americas and Europe have managed to rein in the mpox outbreak, Asia has become a new hotspot for the disease. The origins of this outbreak can be traced back to mid-2022. Countries such as Japan, South Korea, and Thailand experienced sporadic cases last year. However, this year has witnessed a notable upswing, with these nations reporting double-digit cases on a weekly basis.
WHO suggests China is a major concern
The most recent data from WHO highlights China’s emergence as a major concern. In the last three months alone, China has documented 315 confirmed mpox cases. The accuracy of these numbers is challenged by inconsistencies in reporting from the Chinese government, making it challenging to fully comprehend the true scale of the outbreak within the country.
In efforts to contain mpox, various nations have employed different strategies. While the disease is less contagious than Covid-19, its impact has been felt globally, affecting thousands. One key factor in controlling mpox has been proactive measures like vaccination. However, in China, questions have arisen about the efficacy of the government’s actions in tackling the outbreak, as some experts argue that more could be done.
According to a report from South China Morning Post, Hong Kong, too, has witnessed a surge in mpox cases, believed to be a delayed result of the relaxation of Covid-19 travel restrictions. Experts caution that this trend might lead to more infections spilling over from mainland China, which has recently seen a significant rise in cases. While the overall threat to the general population remains relatively low, concerns are arising over the necessity of hospital isolation for mpox patients, especially those with mild symptoms.
The Big Apple’s spiraling drug crisis has reached a new low, with depravity across the city so commonplace, a glass-eyed junkie can stand in the middle of a Midtown sidewalk on a weekday morning for five long minutes — with a needle jutting out of his scab-covered arm.
The horrific example played out Wednesday around 11 a.m. on West 37th Street, where the man stood motionless with a needle jabbed into his vein, as passersby so numb to it all blithely maneuvered around him.
“That’s what I used to see when I was a kid, people all overdosed in the middle of the street — and dead,” Angel Figueroa, 55, who works in Midtown and grew up surrounded by the ills of addiction in the Lower East Side, told The Post.
“This world went backward, not forward.”
Even junkies such as Abraham Hwang, 32, can clearly see how grim the drug crisis has become in New York City, which he said is “at the climax” of the epidemic.
A zonked-out man stood in Midtown for 5 long minutes with a needle jutting out of his arm. Helayne Seidman
“I thought Long Island was bad,” said Hwang — who recently moved to the Big Apple with the hope of getting clean.
“My addiction definitely got worse here,” he said, plunging a needle into his neck to get his fix in front of a vacant storefront in the middle of West 36th Street.
On Wednesday, junkies later were spotted across the street from where the man with the needle in his arm stood, in front of a health center run by the nonprofit Housing Works, which provides clean syringes to addicts as part of its controversial “harm reduction” services.
Pamela Flamini, a 45-year-old cashier at the Italian restaurant Non Solo Piada, located across the street from the Housing Works center, ripped the nonprofit and the city’s open, growing embrace of harm reduction policies and services as the reason why her workplace is burglarized multiple times a week.
Abraham Hwang, who fled Long Island to get clean in New York City, said his addiction has gotten worse since. Helayne Seidman
“All drug addicts, they come here, [make a] long line in the morning,” Flamini said, adding that drug dealers also lurk in the area like vultures, and have threatened her.
“The people afterward [are] like a zombie. They come and steal things.”
Housing Works has raked in at least $80 million in taxpayer funding since 2018 for its housing programs and services, including substance abuse treatment. The group refused to comment.
The sight of junkies with used syringes at their feet and arms covered in blood has been a regular sighting for bespoke embroidery designer Ryan Abrams, 39, who works just a few dozen feet down from where the needle man stood.
Housing Works provides clean needles to junkies, many of whom locals say shoot up on the block. Helayne Seidman
“I see someone shoot up here every day,” Abrams said.
“I started bringing a Taser to work because people were throwing garbage cans and lunging at you with bloody arms.”
Tourists en route to Macy’s or Broadway matinees are shocked by the Big Apple’s theater of the absurd.
“On Madison Avenue, they were injecting themselves…the blokes were out in the open. They’re not bothered,” sighed Charlie Callow, 59, who was visiting with his wife and their two kids from Northampton, England.
“The last time I came [to the city] was a long time ago but it’s changed a hell of a lot.”
Workers, meanwhile, are terrified to come into the office these days, fearful of being randomly attacked by addicts getting high outside their buildings.
“These people, they can go crazy, they can stick you with the dirty needles for nothing,” said maintenance worker Andro Macapinlac, 46, standing not five feet away from a group of junkies sucking on crack pipes out along his office building on West 36th Street.
“You don’t want to come to work like this, risking your life,” he added.
he survey received over 19,000 responses from residents of Delhi-NCR, Maharashtra and Karnataka.
Amid the new Covid variant Eris, at least one in three households in Karnataka, one in five in Delhi-NCR and one in six in Maharashtra have someone with viral fever or Covid-like symptoms, a survey by LocalCircles has found.
The symptoms of Eris are reported as sore throat, runny nose, blocked nose, sneezing, dry cough, headache, wet cough, hoarse voice, muscle aches, fever and altered smell.
The survey received over 19,000 responses from residents of Delhi-NCR, Maharashtra and Karnataka. A total of 63% respondents were men, while 37% were women.
The survey asked residents of Maharashtra, “How many individuals do you have in your household who currently have one or more Covid/ flu/ viral fever symptoms like fever, runny nose, sore throat, cough, headache, joint pain, body ache, respiratory issues, etc.?” A total of 62% of the respondents were men, while 38% were women.
This query received 7,652 responses, with 12% indicating that one individual in their household was unwell with Covid/viral symptoms, while 4% indicated that two-three individuals in their household were unwell. The remaining 84% indicated that “no one, thankfully” was unwell in their household. In sum, 16% of households surveyed in Maharashtra now have one or more individuals with COVID/ viral symptoms.
The survey sought to understand the situation from residents of Delhi-NCR. A total of 66% of the respondents were men, while 34% were women.
Of the 7,888 households in Delhi-NCR who responded to the same query, 14% indicated that 2-3 members in their household were unwell, and 7% indicated one person was unwell. However, 79% of respondents were thankful that as yet “no one” was unwell in their household.
In sum, 21% of households surveyed in Delhi-NCR currently have one or more individuals with viral/Covid-like symptoms.
