00:00The counties of Victoria, St. Patrick and Kareni are accounting for over 86% of the cases.
00:08The Minister of Health says the country has now officially recorded 509 cases of dengue and five deaths linked to the mosquito-borne disease.
00:18Dengue cases and deaths have been on a steep incline globally this year and here at home it's the same with the young and old most affected.
00:29The age group between 6 and 20 years old is accounting for 78% of the cases.
00:40So the younger population, those most likely to succumb to severe dengue, especially severe hemorrhagic dengue where you have bleeding,
00:51is going to be the younger population, children and the elderly with comorbidities.
00:56Because your immune system in children isn't well developed and your immune system in the elderly with comorbidities is compromised.
01:03The Ministry's Insect Vector Control Department says they have visited over 150,000 homes for the year already and it's clear
01:13the main breeding sites for the Aedes aegypti mosquito include barrels of water, gardening containers, plant pot saucers
01:22and unsanitary environments littered with garbage.
01:26On Thursday, the Minister and members of the IVCD emphasised that the mosquitoes which carry the dengue virus
01:34breed in clean, stagnant water and rejected complaints that unclear drains are contributing to the rise in cases.
01:42The main source of breeding is clear, clean, stagnant water and not the mossy drains and ponds that the media loves to highlight
01:53and asks what are we doing about the mossy drain, the stagnant drain.
01:59This is the evidence. They are alive and well here in clean, clear, stagnant water and they do not survive in the dirty drain water.
02:10He says so far, public health inspectors have served 166 homeowners with notices to clean up their act but to date, none have been fined.
02:24They are actually getting people who are hostile and uncooperative.
02:31If these inspectors are not there to barter you, they are there to advise you. They are there to save lives.
02:41We don't want to charge people. We just want to encourage people to be responsible.
02:47Minister Dyal Singh says they are developing a legal platform which they plan to take to the Attorney General soon
02:54to see what other legal measures can be implemented if they don't get the level of cooperation needed from the public to tackle the rise in cases.
03:04The Health Minister underscores spraying is not the answer.
03:09If spraying is to be effective, you have to spray the same area every 10 days when each cycle of adults arise.
03:18That is physically impossible and biologically irresponsible because what happens is that you build up resistance in the mosquitoes
03:29and over-spraying is dangerous to human health, fish, animal, insect health and you destroy the ecosystem.
03:40Cindy Raghuban Tika Singh, TV6 News.
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