St Lucia on ‘high alert’ following suspected dengue death
From Caribbean360
Chief Medical Officer Dr. Merlyn Fredericks said her Ministry is awaiting confirmation that a child may have succumbed after suffering from dengue like symptoms.
CASTRIES, St Lucia, Thursday October 10, 2013, CMC – St.Lucia’s Health Ministry has put the country on high alert for dengue fever and has already reported one suspected death from the disease.
Chief Medical Officer Dr. Merlyn Fredericks said her Ministry is awaiting confirmation that a child may have succumbed after suffering from dengue like symptoms.
Fredericks held a news conference on Wednesday, to express concern about the increased vulnerability of St.Lucians to the disease, following the discovery of an increase in the number of reported cases .
She noted that while there is a reported increase, the situation has not reached epidemic proportions, nonetheless the public is being urged to be cautious.
“Dengue fever is endemic in St.Lucia, which means that we do have some cases year round, but mainly during the rainy season when the unsupervised collection of water becomes breeding ground for the Ades aegypti mosquito which transmits the infection.
This year we have seen quite a significant increase for the month of September, although its not yet at the level that we realised in 2011 when we experienced an epidemic, but we do believe the public needs to placed on an alert,” she noted.
The Ministry official has advised that the most effective means of preventing the spread of the disease is to avoid breeding places for the vector that causes the illness.
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