Health Minister for developing mechanism to ascertain dengue data

New Delhi: Union Health Ministry has directed officials to develop a mechanism to ascertain accurate dengue patient details at the central level to help remove discrepancies in collection of data related to its cases.

The move came after the Ministry found that the data currently generated by the national programme and the state governments are "highly variable".

"Union Health Minister J P Nadda has directed the officials to develop a mechanism to address the patients' detail at the central level which will help remove the discrepancies in data of dengue cases and other related information.

"The data currently generated by the national programme and the state government are highly variable, there is a need for a pragmatic system to collect accurate data," an official statement said.

Nadda while chairing a high-level meeting yesterday to review the dengue situation said the data quality also needs to be monitored and assessed periodically.

The death toll due to dengue in the national capital has increased to 38 even as the number of patients down with the vector-borne fever this year climbed to a menacing 7,606 till October 3.

Nadda also emphasized that there should be no laxity in the ongoing activities being undertaken and there should be availability of designated beds for dengue, blood products including platelets while no one should be refused admission.

"Lessons learnt should be incorporated in adopting measures to tackle the situation. Day to day monitoring should be continued," he said.

He also urged the Delhi government to engage Residential Welfare Associations (RWAs) and volunteers to spread awareness about the dengue situation.

He said that his Ministry is "constantly" reviewing and monitoring the situation with the state government, municipal corporations, NDMC, Delhi Cantonment Board, central government hospitals in Delhi and the National Vector Borne Disease Control Programme (NVBDCP).

Preparatory activities for creating awareness and preventing dengue had been started since the beginning of February this year by the Ministry while in addition, the states were supported to prepare for the disease through meetings, sensitization workshops, meeting with public representatives including mayors and corporators.