Lanka turns red

11 September 2010 09:17 am Views - 4202

An assessment by the Indian Union health ministry, with help from data compiled by the Centre for Disease Control, Atlanta, has found that Sri Lanka is among countries facing a serious outbreak of dengue, the Times of India reported today.

Being called by the WHO as the most rapidly spreading mosquito-borne viral disease in the world, experts say that an estimated 50 million dengue infections are occurring annually and 2.5 billion people live in dengue-endemic countries.

According to the latest global figures, in the southeast Asia region (SEAR), till July 10, Indonesia recorded 80,065 cases of dengue, Thailand 57,948 (till August 20), Sri Lanka 28,955 and Myanmar 12,000.

In comparison, India recorded around 6,885 cases till August 10, Maldives 550, Bangladesh 76, Bhutan 16, Nepal 2 and Timor Leste 473.

While the SEAR recorded a total of 1.67 lakh cases of dengue fever till July, the virus killed 339 people in the region during the same period. Bhutan recorded the highest case fatality rate of 2.28 followed by Sri Lanka 0.99, Indonesia 0.89, Myanmar 0.75 and India 0.62.

Times of India today quoted India’s Union health secretary K Sujatha Rao as saying, "Dengue is in all parts of the world now. Figures show Delhi has recorded just over 1,652 cases, which is small when seen in comparison to the population of the state. It's not like countries issuing travel advisories themselves aren't reporting dengue cases."

"This is just a game. There should have been a travel advisory against visiting US when the country was seeing a major outbreak of H1N1 swine flu a few months back. Nothing happened then. Delhi is completely safe. The numbers in India are small compared to countries like Thailand, Indonesia and Sri Lanka," Rao added.