New Delhi: A dengue outbreak in Telangana, particularly in the capital city of Hyderabad, has claimed more than 50 lives according to reports. Over the past 25 days, 530 confirmed cases of dengue have been reported in the state, of which more than 370 are from Hyderabad.
The actual number of deaths because of the vector-borne disease may be higher. A senior health department official told the Times of India that in many cases, patients who are admitted to hospitals have “other co-morbid conditions such as diabetes, hypertension, kidney failure and heart disease among others”. If such a patient dies, it is “not declared as a dengue death although the death occurs due to dengue”, the official said.
There have been 2,113 cases reported so far this year, more than double the corresponding number for last year (1,012), according to the Times of India. The alarming number of suspected dengue cases has prompted the health department to consider expanding tests from being conducted just at the Institute of Preventive Medicine to include private diagnostic centres.
Because the disease-causing mosquitoes breed in stagnant water, colonies surrounding water bodies have faced the brunt. According to the New Indian Express, three minors died over the past ten days in housing societies around Gopi Cheruvu (lake) in Chandanagar due to seasonal fevers and suspected dengue. The youngest child was only six-months-old.
Residents of the area told the newspaper that some colonies lacked waste disposal and sewage systems. They also accused the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) of failing to sanitise the area.
Reports of minors succumbing to the disease also emerged from other areas of Hyderabad.
The government has been accused of trying to underplaying the outbreak. The state’s health minister Eatala Rajender refused to state the number of dengue deaths. He said the reported figures need to “cross-checked” by an expert committee before an announcement can be made. “We can only make an announcement after the entire process is concluded next year,” the minister said.
However, the government belatedly swung into action on Wednesday, asking the GHMC and the health department to coordinate “special mosquito breeding prevention drives” in Hyderabad. Even after this meeting, health minister Rajender claimed that “there were no serious infectious diseases spreading in Hyderabad and that the diseases are only seasonal”.
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This follows directives given by the health department to cancel leaves of doctors in government hospitals and requesting state-run hospitals to work on Sundays. Apart from Hyderabad and Ranga Reddy districts, the government also identified Mahbubnagar, Mulugu, Nizamabad, Khammam, Medchal and Warangal (urban) as high-risk areas.
A press release issued on Monday also said the Telangana government has taken “special measures like the opening of 24-hour Out-Patient Department (OPD) services to control cases of dengue” in Osmania General Hospital, Gandhi Hospital, among others.
The hospitals are also having to tackle false information being spread on WhatsApp about ‘dengue fever medication’. The messages say fever medication is available at the Osmania hospital, NIMS and Gandhi hospital, but doctors have refuted the fake messages, saying “there is no targeted cure for dengue other than a symptomatic treatment”.
The superintendent of the Osmania General Hospital told the New Indian Express that no “medicine” is available at the hospital premises, but encouraged patients to avail free treatment in government hospitals. “Most of the times, these messages are spread by pharmacies outside the hospitals,” the superintendent said.
Other messages on social media also claim that papaya leaves can be used to treat dengue, which experts said did not have any scientific backing.
Experts tracking the disease have found a marked increase in dengue cases reported in Hyderabad over the past few years, sparking concerns over sanitation. According to one report, in the Ranga Reddy district – which is part of the Greater Hyderabad municipal area – the number of confirmed dengue cases increased from just five in 2014 to 41 in 2015, jumping to 150 last year. The report also says that confirmed cases of other vector-borne diseases such as Chikungunya and Japanese Encephalitis have increased. In contrast, cases of malaria, another vector-borne disease, declined.
As The Wire has previously reported, dengue is distinct from other vector-borne diseases because of the “generality of its symptoms: high fever, headaches and joint pain, indicative of any viral infection”. However, identifying the disease is complicated because only one in four dengue infections manifest symptoms. “…asymptomatic cases act as carriers of infection, a silent reservoir that can aid the spread of dengue epidemics,” Sandhya Sekhar wrote in The Wire.