CASES of dengue fever in Western Visayas is going down but the regional office of the Department of Health (DOH) looks at dengue as a top infectious disease in the region and known as a “year round public health threat.”
DOH Assistant Regional Director Ma. Paz Corrales said the Regional Epidemiology and Surveillance Unit (Resu) monitored all the cases up to its 20th morbidity week. The figure is 69.36 percent lower compared to the same period in 2013.
Corrales said the region reached 1,399 dengue cases and six deaths from January 1 to May 17, 2014 in the province of Capiz having the most number of cases at 417 with one death.
The province of Iloilo has 282 cases and four deaths during the same period, while the province of Aklan follows with 251 cases and no death.
The province of Negros Occidental has 179 cases with one death, while Iloilo City posts 1258 cases with no death.
Bacolod City posts 54 cases, the province of Antique with 42 cases and Guimaras with 13 cases.
The DOH is also sending alert to parents of schoolchildren on diseases during the rainy season and diseases like cholera, diarrhea, hepatitis A and typhoid fever; influenza, leptospirosis and dengue spawned by day-biting aedes aegypt and aedes albopictus mosquitoes.
Corrales said the main prevention of the diseases are environment sanitation and personal hygiene, food and water safety, and healthy lifestyle. (Lydia C. Pendon)