KUALA
LUMPUR, Malaysia—Deaths from dengue in
Malaysia shot up this year, doubling that of 2012, as the tropical country
battles with a raging mosquito-borne virus that claims hundreds of lives
annually in Southeast Asia.
Four
patients — three women and one man — died in the week ending Dec. 21, leaving
88 dead in Malaysia in the first 51 weeks of this year. In 2012, 35 people died
in Malaysia of dengue, data from the Ministry of Health show.
Malaysia
suffered the worst dengue bout on record in 2010, when 134 people died and
46,171 cases were reported. In 2011, 36 people died in Malaysia, with 19,884
people infected.
As of
Dec. 21, dengue cases totaled 41,226 , nearly doubling from 21,444 cases in
same period in 2012.
“As
long as infection and outbreak of dengue fever continues, the risk of death
remains,” said Lokman Hakim, deputy director general at Malaysia’s Ministry of
Health.
The
virus, which is transmitted by the Aedes aegypti mosquito, causes severe fever,
headaches, rashes and muscle and joint pain. Severe forms can cause hemorrhagic
fever. No vaccine is currently available, and treatment is largely limited to
intravenous rehydration.
Selangor
state, which borders the capital city of Kuala Lumpur, has been hit the
hardest, reporting 24 deaths, the Ministry said. The southern state of Johor
that borders Singapore, has recorded 21 fatalities.
Selangor
is home to 88 of the 89 dengue “hotspots,” or areas that have witnessed a jump
in outbreaks, with Negeri Sembilan accounting for the other.
To try
to reduce dengue, Health Ministry officials routinely search thousands of
premises around the country to identify potential breeding grounds. People who
have pools of stagnant water containing Aedes’s larvae face fines of a minimum
of 500 ringgit (US$152). Those who fail to pay could be fined as much as 10,000
ringgit, face up to two years in jail, or both for a first offense. Repeat offenders
can be fined five times as much or face five years imprisonment.
“Of
late, the searches have become very frequent,” said Shakeel Mustafa, a manager
at a restaurant in a suburb bordering Kuala Lumpur. “We ensure that the alley
behind our kitchen is cleaned every day.”
The
ministry has also urged citizens to drain out stagnant water from around their
houses and pressed non-profit organizations to bolster efforts to educate the
public about hygiene.
Government
health workers frequently conduct checks at construction sites, where tiny
puddles serve as breeding grounds for the urban pests, and fumigate schools and
other public places.
Abhrajit
Gangopadhyay
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