LAHORE: Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif has set an
unprecedented and bizarre example of its kind in the epidemiological
disease control amongst about 110 countries of the globe where Dengue
Fever is endemic.
Public Health experts and Community Medicine
academicians were shocked to know about the decision of Chief Minister
Punjab Shahbaz Sharif’s decision of closing down educational
institutions including universities and medical institutes too.
According
to the experts the Chief Minister should have waited for the Sri Lankan
experts before taking this counterproductive decision. They were of the
view that by closing down medical institutes as well, the chief
minister has shut down the potential of effective control.
According
to Dr Aftab, Head of the Community Medicine Department University
College of Medicine University of Lahore, none of these countries, some
of which has shown an excellent control of Dengue Fever epidemics, have
ever closed their education institutions in Dengue epidemic.
Adding
to his argument he said though “we can see different guidelines and
principles for control of this epidemic but let’s just review some of
the facts related to the disease.”
Dengue Fever always spread
through a Vector which is a specific mosquito and never can have direct
transmission like a droplet infection, while closure of institutions
and abandoning the public gatherings can only be recommended in the
diseases which spread through sneezing and coughing i.e. droplet
infections.
Eighty per cent of the infections are not serious
infections and usually do not proceed to the stage where platelet count
is needed and where any high tech equipment is involved. The mosquito
which plays the role of vector in this disease is habitant of the
domestic and peri-domestic places, meaning thereby that we pushed to
masses towards the breading sites of the vector instead of abolishing
them, he maintained.
Dr Muhammad Aslam Bajwa Assistant
Professor at the Department drew the attention to towards the
guidelines of World Health Organization, which clearly states that it
is a purely public health and sanitation disease and environment
modification should include, drying the water collection sites
specially where the fresh water is collected in the community and
collecting as well as disposing the garbage from homes hence abolishing
the peri-domestic breading sites of vector.
“Spraying
Insecticides has a very less role in vector control of dengue fever as
once again the main emphasis is on the environmental modification,” he
said.
According to these experts, WHO recommends that public
health bodies should be strengthened and community participation should
be increased for achieving good control, “while we have abandoned the
community participation by closing them in their homes where the risk
is already maximum and lost the potential source of awareness and
disease control by even closing the medical colleges and universities”.
So it is imperative that instead of giving stories and breaking
news of the chaos and panic to the media there should be a serious
effort by consulting some sound epidemiologist or even by reviewing the
set guidelines of WHO.
They narrated appropriate measures
including sanitation and other line departments, taking a collaborative
action, involving the communities and using this epidemic as a stimulus
for environment modification.
They stressed that state of shock
is basically a gap between fast moving event and lack of information
which has exactly expressed by the provincial government for
controlling an epidemic which is emerging consistently for about last
three to four years. Online
