It has been revealed that district health officers of Municipal Corporations of Delhi have been mixing negligible amount of insecticides, lesser than the prescribed limit, in water filled tanks and spraying it to ‘prevent the breeding of mosquitoes’ and the process is being done without any supervision.
If sources are to be believed, first the insecticides are purchased by the corporation from a private company and then allotted to District Health Officers (DHO’s) on demand but there is no mechanism to check that whether the DHOs are further using the insecticides in prescribed quantity or just spraying water to prevent vector-borne diseases.
The source further highlighted that insecticides worth between Rs 1.5-1.7 lakh are filled inside a tank used for spraying the same and the DHO’s dilute only a negligible amount of insecticides in order to avoid getting caught.
“The insecticides cost Rs 1,050 per kg. Now, the DHO’s sell insecticides back to the company at 50 per cent the cost of the purchased price to make personal gains,” the alleged the official narrating the nature of the crime.
Talking to The Pioneer SDMC Mayor Kamaljeet Sehrawat said “We have called a meeting of the concerned officials and DHO’s next week in this regard. “A team will be formed to randomly check the quantity of insecticide, diluted in water while spraying,” she said.
The Capital has registered its first dengue death reported this season, a 12-year-old boy succumbed to the vector-borne disease, as per the report released by the three municipal corporations of Delhi on Monday. The report also revealed 153 fresh cases of dengue, 50 cases of malaria and 44 fresh cases of chikungunya till August 19. With the spurt, the total cases of dengue, malaria and chikungunya recorded this year are 657, 451 and 311 respectively.
Meanwhile, South Delhi Municipal Corporation (SDMC) Commissioner Dr Puneet Kumar Goel on Thursday stressed upon the need of to buy dengue free coolers, approved by National Center for Disease Control but experts fears that the cases of vector borne diseases may be worst this year and like every year the agency would be busy in putting plans to promote the scientifically proved cooler on paper only.
“These all attempts are a futile exercise as the official only wants to be in news instead of doing something solid. The irresponsible attitudes of the civic bodies have put thousands of lives at stake,” experts said.