Schools shut as Sri Lanka battles dengue

Sri Lanka yesterday announced it was intensifying its war on dengue fever, with schools to shut across the island to help curb the unprecedented outbreak of the virus, which has claimed nearly 300 lives. The Red Cross also announced it was scaling up its emergency response to the country’s worst-ever outbreak of the disease as the number of dengue cases topped 100,000. That figure is nearly double the previous year, with doctors warning that hospitals were beyond capacity as medics struggled to treat a new strain of the disease. The education ministry said schools would shut from Friday for four days. Official figures show 290 people have died so far this year from dengue, nearly four times the fatalities recorded last year.