Dong Nai: increasing dengue cases

A child patient of dengue fever is being treated in hospital (Source: VNA)

Dengue fever is becoming more complicated in the southern province of Dong Nai with the monthly average of dengue infections requiring hospitalisation suddenly increasing to between 100 and 300 cases in the last two months.

According to statistics by the Thong Nhat General Hospital, there were 110 dengue patients treated in the hospital in July with the figure rising to over 200 cases in August.

The Dong Nai General Hospital received around 300 people with dengue infections in August, up from 200 in the previous month.

In the Dong Nai Children’s hospital, the number of children suffering from the disease accounted for 12 percent of the total patients being treated in the hospital in August.

In the first six months of this year, provincial-level hospitals in Dong Nai recorded only about 50 hospitalised dengue patients every month.

Huynh Cao Hai, Deputy Director of the provincial Department of Health, said over 3,700 cases of dengue were reported in Dong Nai in the first eight months of this year, up nearly 140 percent year-on-year with two fatalities.

Districts and cities with rapid urbanisation such as Bien Hoa city, Long Thanh and Trang Bom districts have been hardest hit by the disease.

The local health sector has rolled out a series of measures to prevent outbreaks, including spraying mosquito repellent in high-risk areas, arranging communication campaigns to raise public awareness of the danger of the disease and enacting precautionary measures.

The province’s Steering Committee for preventing and eliminating dangerous diseases plans to intensify its precautionary measures to effectively control the disease.-VNA