GENERAL SANTOS CITY (MindaNews / 21 February)—Health authorities in this city reminded residents to be cautious over a noted increasing number of dengue cases, mostly involving children.
But there were no dengue-related deaths reported this year so far, Dioscorro Nuñez III, health education and promotion officer at the City Health Office, said on Wednesday.
He said that as of February 18, at least 378 cases were already listed in a monitoring that began January 1. He said this is a 10-percent rise compared to the number of dengue infected residents during the same period in 2023.
Notably, Nuñez earlier told local radio station Barangay 102.3FM that there were 280 dengue cases listed as of February 4, which shows the number of infected jumped to nearly a hundred over a two-week period.
Of the 378 dengue cases, 289 were hospitalized, Nuñez said.
Most of the infected come from villages in the city with large population—Calumpang with 56, Lagao with 53, and San Isidro with 33.
In a February 20 report, the CHO’s Epidemiology Surveillance Unit (CESU) noted that the ages of infected individuals range from eight months old to 87 years old, and mostly are nine-year-old kids. More than 50 percent of the infected are females, the CESU report said.
Nuñez said residents were advised to take the needed precautions like maintaining clean surroundings, making sure there are no potential mosquito breeding areas to avoid getting infected with the mosquito-borne virus of the hemorrhagic fever.
In a similar situation in 2023, dengue cases in the city surged to 962, more than 500 percent from January to May from figures of the same period in 2022 at only 160 cases.
But Dr. Lalaine Calonzo, the acting city health officer, then said there was no cause for alarm because the increase was a result of an aggressive dengue testing campaign conducted by the city’s 12 rural health units, not done in the past.
The dengue tests involved residents who were exhibiting initial dengue-like symptoms and tagged “dengue suspects” and have yet to undergo laboratory and further confirmatory tests.
Despite the reported high figures, the Department of Health (DOH) has not declared an outbreak in the city.
Calonzo pointed out that in the last five years or so, the increase in the number of dengue cases in the city did not fall within the median range that would justify declaring a dengue outbreak.
Another outbreak indicator is for the city’s dengue fatality rate to be one percent of the total number of dengue cases. No deaths related to dengue have been reported so far.
Health authorities said dengue is no longer a seasonal infection that comes only during the rainy season.
“Dengue can now spread at any time of the year,” Nunez noted. (Rommel G. Rebollido / MindaNews)