25 wards turn dengue hotspots

As many as 25 of the 100 wards in the Coimbatore city limits had turned dengue hot spots recently.

Sources in the civic body said of the 268 dengue-positive cases reported since the start of the new year, the 25 wards accounted for around 55% cases – 147.

The Corporation had identified Wards 41, 46, 40, 44 and 38 in the North Zone, 100, 86, 96, 99 and 95 in South Zone, 57, 61, 37, 56 and 66 in East Zone, 11, 18, 19, 20 and 21 in West Zone an d73, 25, 74, 80 and 82 in Central Zone to be the hot spots, the sources said and added that the numbers were of wards before the recent change.

The Corporation had deployed additional workforce – domestic breeding checkers – in those wards to destroy mosquito breeding sources – disused or discarded items lying in and around houses, remove fresh water stagnation in sunshades and other places in the houses and educate the residents of those wards.

It had also asked the workers to put in more hours in those wards and tasked medical officers with the job on ensuing that the workers stayed till the end of their work hours in those wards.

The Corporation had asked the domestic breeding checkers to urge all residents in those 25 wards to tightly close all drinking water storage containers such as drums to ensure that no mosquito breeding took place, for the dengue-causing Aedes aegypti mosquito bred in fresh water.

The sources said the Corporation was also taking steps to improve the frequency of water supply in those areas, for it found a direct correlation between water supply and dengue case load.

The bigger the water supply cycle the residents tend to store water in more containers and that led to mosquito breeding. If the Corporation were to supply water more frequently, the residents need not store water for long and that could lead to a reduction, the sources reasoned.

Source: Read Full Article