Stung by the rising number of dengue and swine flu cases, the Government has evoked the provisions of the Uttarakhand Epidemic Act, 2017 in the State.
In a communiqué, the office of the Director-General Health Services said that under the powers conferred by section two of the Act, information about every patient of dengue or malaria is needed to be registered. After the imposition of the Act all Government and private hospitals and doctors would have to treat every patient of fever as suspected patient of malaria and get his blood sample tested for the disease. The information about the malaria patients should be compulsorily provided to the nearest Government hospital and the district vector-borne diseases officer should be informed within seven days.
Under the Act the DG or Chief Medical Officer (CMO) of districts would appoint an inspection officer who would be the Additional CMO or Vector Borne Diseases Officer. This officer would have the authority for monitoring, treatment, fogging, anti-larval activity and enter the premises of any office and compound to do necessary checks. These designated officers can inquire any suspected patient of malaria and dengue and can take his blood sample for tests.
Elaborate instruction about dengue is also provided in the notification and all hospitals have to inform about the suspected patients of dengue to the CMO office or district vector borne disease officer without delay. The hospital would also send the sample of suspected patient for the ElISA test for confirmation of dengue. The rapid test for dengue would not be acceptable as positive case of dengue.
It is clearly mentioned in the paragraph 12 (5) that the in-charge of the hospital would be solely responsible in delay in preventive measure and treatment of disease if information about suspected patients of the disease is not provided.
Swine flu toll is 16
Dehradoon: The twin onslaught of dengue and swine flu in the provisional State Capital is continuing. One more patient has succumbed to H1N1 virus in Dehradun.
With this death the death toll due to swine flu this season has mounted to 16. The deceased 48-year old female, a resident of Gajjiwala, Dehradun, was admitted in the Mahant Indiresh (MI) hospital on August 26. Her report was sent for confirmatory test on August 28.
She succumbed to the disease on August 30 and as it generally happens the positive report of the patient arrived a day after her death. The district health dept has so far reported 120 patients as positive for H1N1.