GENERAL SANTOS CITY (MindaNews/23 August) — Health personnel here have intensified their anti-dengue fumigation activities as dengue cases in various parts of the city continue to rise.
Dr. Lalaine Calonzo, assistant chief of the City Integrated Health Services office (CIHSO), said they have been conducting fumigation or fogging operations almost daily in selected areas in the city, especially those with rising incidence of dengue.
“The requests for anti-dengue fumigation have been piling up so far. Most of them are from our schools and barangay councils,” she said.
Calonzo said they usually conduct fogging activities within the identified breeding grounds of dengue-carrying mosquitoes as well as shaded and indoor areas.
She assured the public that they carefully evaluate the requests for the anti-dengue fumigation by conducting ocular inspections in the target areas to avoid any indiscriminate fogging.
She said they require residents or occupants of the target areas to conduct clean-up activities first before the fogging operations.
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“We make sure that they clearly understand that fogging will not have any significant effect if the breeding grounds of these dengue-carrying mosquitoes are now cleaned up or removed,” she said.
Calonzo said their latest dengue report, which was last updated on August 6, showed that the confirmed dengue cases in the city have reached 816 since January.
She said they already recorded at least five deaths but two local private hospitals reported last week at least two more dengue fatalities, bringing the total number to seven.
Barangay Lagao recorded the most number of confirmed dengue cases with 115 followed by Labangal with 91 and San Isidro with 90.
Calonzo said the city’s dengue incidence has already reached the epidemic stage but stressed that it’s not yet at the outbreak level.
She explained that an outbreak means the clustering of cases in a specific area. This has not happened yet in the city.
“What we’ve been recording is a sporadic distribution of dengue cases. So it’s still on epidemic stage,” Calonzo said.
She added they have completed the information drive in all 26 barangays in the city and are now supervising the regular clean-up activities conducted by the barangay councils and the CIHSO’s sanitary inspection personnel. (Allen V. Estabillo/MindaNews)
