AFTER bringing down the number of dengue cases in Cebu in the past four years, a civic organization will continue its larvicide anti-dengue campaign on Jan. 30, this time with a budget of P8 million.
Rotary International District 3860 Governor Edgar Chiongbian and President Jack Torrejos of the Rotary Club of Cebu Midtown turned over to the Department of Education (DepEd) the anti-dengue temephos last Jan. 23.
Torrejos said DepEd 7 Director Carmelita Dulangon and seven school division superintendents received 40,000 hygiene kits for distribution to 40,000 public school teachers who will join the anti-dengue campaign scheduled on Jan. 30.
The larvicide anti-dengue campaign was started in 2010 after anti-dengue chair Dr. Wyben Briones of the Rotary Club of Metro Cebu discovered that there 102 people, mostly children, died of the disease that year.
In 2011, or one year after the first massive anti-dengue campaign, Briones found out that dengue cases decreased to only 700 cases with 10 death in Cebu City, which is much lower that Metro Manila with 10,000 cases while more than 3,000 cases in Quezon City.
Briones attributed the decrease to the larvicide campaign, where temephos is scattered in stagnant water to kill aedes aegypti larvae, which grows into a mosquito and causes dengue.
Meanwhile, Torrejos said Dulangon confirmed that 45,000 teachers will participate in the massive larvicide, but 5,000 of them will have no hygiene kits.
“We are giving sanitary kits to the teachers as form of reward for participating in the anti-dengue campaign to make their pupils and students safe.
But our budget is good for 40,000 kits only,” Torrejos said.
Effective
In an earlier interview, Department of Health Secretary Enrique Ona said the larvicide anti-dengue campaign is very effective and he is happy that a civic group is leading the campaign every year.
Last Jan. 21 during the Kapihan sa PIA (Philippine Information Agency), Dr. Cynthia Genesolango, chief of the of the Cebu Provincial Health Office; Dr. Alma Corpin, field program division chief of the Cebu City Health Department; and Dr. Maria Socorro Entera, Department of Health (DOH) 7 chief of maternal and child care section; said that larvicide anti-dengue campaign of Rotary International is very effective in reducing dengue cases.