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Tuesday, January 04, 2005
City 'treats' 16T against fatal blood illness
BAGUIO CITY -- Health workers intensified the administering of antibiotics to residents of 21 barangays as well as market vendors and jeepney drivers in anticipation of a renewed surge of meningococcemia cases.
An engineer believed to have contracted meningococcemia, an acute infection of the bloodstream, died on January 1, the first recorded fatality for this year and latest person suspected to have died of the disease in the city.
Health Secretary Manuel Dayrit said in Manila that 16,000 market vendors and jeepney drivers in Baguio City were given antibiotics as a preventive measure.
Dayrit, who was ordered by Arroyo to check on the status of the disease in the city, told a press conference in Malacaņang the main defense against the contagious blood illness is prophylactic treatment or "preventive antibiotic treatment of the population which you think has been infected."
Health authorities are concentrating on the marketplace because in some countries, according to Dayrit, the disease started in this area and is easily spread because there is "very close and prolonged contact" between individuals.
The same aggressive action is being done in barangays where two suspected meningococcemia patients reside.
"So we can say we're confident that the epidemic is contained. We think there will be fewer and fewer (cases) until eventually, they go away," he added.
Dr. Jasmin Igama, a member of the Baguio General Hospital and Medical Center Meningo Response Team, also recommended giving antibiotics not only to jeepney drivers, whose staging areas are within market premises, but taxi drivers as well because they are constantly exposed to possible carriers of the dreaded bacteria.
Meningococcemia is caused by Neisseria meningitides, which frequently lives in a person's upper respiratory tract, and is transmitted from person-to-person through respiratory droplets.
Although the disease is not so contagious as other communicable diseases, it is difficult to identify in the early stages because it sometimes mimics symptoms of other illnesses.
The disease is also nevertheless deadly because its true symptoms, which include high fever and spotty red or purple rash, could show in the later stage and worsen in a matter of hours.
The 34-year-old male engineer who died on New Year's Day had complained of a fever just the day before.
He was brought to the Baguio General Hospital at 5 a.m. of January 1 due to "very high fever" and died one hour later.
A relative of the engineer said that before he complained of a fever, the victim was said to have lacked sleep and was on a diet, and his family suspects this could have contributed to his getting meningococcemia.
Since the start of the disease's appearance in late October, the Baguio Health Department has recorded 42 cases of meningococcemia, with 20 confirmed to have died from the illness.
The most number of admissions was recorded in December, at 25 cases, of which 10 died.
The other cases were diagnosed as either dengue or typhoid fever.
Igama said health workers and hospital administrators should avoid making several referrals to different hospitals, saying this could possibly cause the spread of the bacteria, as several people or contacts are exposed to a suspect patient in the transportation process alone.
She cited an instance when a patient from one barangay was brought to the Benguet General Hospital.
The hospital, however, referred the patient to the Saint Louis University Sacred Heart Hospital, which had the patient transferred to the Baguio Medical Center, then to the Baguio General Hospital, where the patient was said to have expired, an hour after he was brought in.
She explained that containing the spread of the disease means lessening the mobility, most especially of people who were exposed to a suspect meningo patient.
Following the discovery of new cases of the disease, the City Government has decided to purchase the antibiotic Ceftriaxone, the medicine used to treat severe cases of meningococcemia, within the week.
City Accountant Antonio Tabin was already directed to prepare the disbursement voucher needed for the release of funds.
Dr. Manuel Factora, Baguio General Hospital chief, told Mayor Braulio Yaranon in Monday's executive-legislative meeting that the medicine is most effective in treating cases with "short duration symptoms."
A single dose of the medicine costs around P1,600.
A patient diagnosed to have acquired the bacteria will be given two doses of the medicine in a day for a week, or roughly around P25,000, on top of other medications that would be administered. (Rimaliza Opiņa/With Sunnex Luzon)
(January 4, 2005 issue)
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