MASSIVE ANTI-DENGUE CAMPAIGN IN WESTERN PROVINCE
National Dengue Control Unit (NDCU)
Close to 20,000 households were inspected in the Western Province by the National Dengue Control Unit (NDCU) this week. Officers found 4,000 potential dengue breeding grounds and 508 dengue breeding grounds during the dengue prevention campaign that was launched by the Unit this week.
Speaking to the Daily Mirror, Consultant community physician at the National Dengue Control Unit, Dr Preshila Samaraweera said that 100 red notices had been issued and legal action had been taken against 190 individuals.
“Most of the dengue breeding grounds we found were in schools and construction sites. We have come to notice that those who maintain construction sites are repeat offenders. We have taken legal action against many of them but there seems to be no change in the precautions they take,” she said.
The programme organized by the Dengue Control Unit saw officers, including public health inspectors and army officers, on door to door inspections across Colombo. The teams will investigate possible dengue breeding grounds, issue red notices and ensure legal action is taken against residents who flout directions set out by authorities to control the spread of dengue.
The Colombo Municipality, bracing itself for the impending monsoon rains and the expected increase in dengue patients also embarked on pilot project of setting up new traps to ensnare dengue mosquitoes last month.
Speaking to the Daily Mirror on a previous occasion regarding the project which was implemented at the New Bazzar in Pettah, Colombo Chief Medical Officer (CMO) Dr. Ruwan Wijeymuni stated that the traps would destroy mosquito larvae and thereby reducing the mosquito population and eventually wiping it out.
The trap, made of sustainable material, will create an ideal environment for the female mosquitoes to lay their eggs in. The larvae from these eggs will be killed within 24 hours by the specific mechanism built into the trap, Dr. Wijayamuni explained.
The trap is designed especially for the Aedes Mosquitoe (responsible for transmitting dengue, sika, yellow fever and chicken gunya). The female mosquito laid eggs at least five times during its life span with at least 200-300 eggs laid each time.
The CMO said the trap which was used globally to study epidemics, was developed by PHI Sisira Basnayake and modified by Dr. Subash Mendis. “The main objective of the project is mosquito surveillance and as such we have laid out 1,000 traps under the pilot project.”
The trap did not need any pesticide or electricity and was completely environmentally friendly self sustainable. “The trap becomes more effective as time goes by making it perfect to solve the issue at hand,” Dr. Wijayamuni concluded.
Additionally, the Dehiwela Mount Lavinia Municipality also recently entered into a partnership with the Citra, a social innovation lab, to develop a citizen-centered open source platform for dengue prevention and control.
Citra, a joint initiative between the Ministry of Science, Technology, Research, Skills Development, Vocational Training and Kandyan Heritage, and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in Sri Lanka, uses foresight and innovation tools to prototype and test development solutions to ensure they are agile and holistic. Its work is aligned to the national development priorities and works towards bringing in greater citizen engagement to the formulation of development solutions.
One such initiative is developing an open source platform aimed at preventing and controlling the spread of dengue, with technical expertise from the Department of Town and Country Planning, University of Moratuwa.
The platform, once developed, will improve local government’s efficiency in identifying, managing and monitoring dengue. It will also
Most of the dengue breeding grounds we found were in schools and construction sites. We have come to notice that those who maintain construction sites are repeat offenders. We have taken legal action against many of them but there seems to be no change in the precautions they take
have a citizen engagement feature and will allow communities to identify and notify relevant local government authorities of the prevalence and locations of potential mosquito breeding grounds for necessary action.
The users can send the exact location along with a picture of the potential breeding ground, following which the application will automatically add the location to a website for local health officials to review.
The system provides a user-friendly, interactive web interface to process and analyze the data near real-time. This will help decision makers to predict and/or visualize potential risk-prone areas.
A pilot of this application will be tested initially within the Ratmalana Ministry of Health division under the guidance and leadership of Dr Indika Ellawala, the Chief Medical Officer of the area. According to statistics from the Dengue Control Unit 36 percent of the dengue cases reported in the country were from the Western Province.