TAGUM CITY, Davao del Norte (PIA) – – The City Health Office (CHO) of Tagum is activating its barangay task forces against dengue in a bid to reinvigorate a massive clean-up with the onset of the rainy season.
Guesting in the recent Pakigsayod, CHO Health Education Promotion Officer (HEPO) Rae Catherine Apura said City Mayor Rey T. Uy has issued two executive orders (EO) on Dengue concerns.
EO No . 065 “mandates a city-wide clean-up drive on July 09 to control and reduce the spread of Dengue by eliminating the mosquito breeding sites”, while the separate EO 062 is tasking the barangays and the schools to create a task force against aedes-borne viral diseases.
Tagum CHO Epidemiology Surveillance Unit head, Dr. Hisham Mackno has seen the need to make barangays responsible for keeping the “search and destroy” habit all year round to locate the habitats of dengue virus-carrying mosquitoes.
“Nakita namo katong pag outbreak naglihok pero na stop yon … Wala siya na maintain kadtong mang-limpyo perme, so mao na, gihimo na task force per barangay para sila na mismo ang mag-monitor. Mag monitor lang mi if they are indeed doing what we require them to do to stop the dengue,” Dr. Hisham said.
[We have noted that they’d moved when the outbreak was declared but that was stopped. It was not maintained, the regular clean up; so we are creating the task force per barangay so they will handle the monitoring. We will only monitor if they are indeed doing what we require them to do to stop the dengue.]
Dr. Mackno assured barangay TFs against Dengue to equip them with needed technical skills to do the dengue surveillance.
“They will do dengue surveillance. We will train them because CHO cannot do it alone” he said..
The barangay Dengue TFs are expected to gather random samples of water from containers in 100 households, and to check if these contain mosquito larvae.
The City of Tagum was placed under the State of Calamity due to the dengue outbreak by the Tagum City’s Sanggunian through a resolution on November 20,2023.
In an interview with PIA Davao del Norte December last year, Tagum CHO Chief, Dr. Florendo projected the dengue cases by March 2024 but Dr. Hisham said Dengue outbreak is still hoisted in Tagum City.
“Still taas gihapon, Nakita namo murag naga fluctuate, Naay times nga naga ubos pero nagsaka gihapon.. So wala gyod ingon nga niubos siya sa among goal nga munaug,” Dr. Hisham.
[It is still high. We have seen it fluctuating. There were times it went down but it continues to rise. So it has not really gone down to our goal of decreasing cases.]
Data provided by Tagum CHO-HEPO covering the Morbidity Week June 23 to June 27 showed 25 new cases of Dengue, bringing to a total of 728 confirmed and suspected Dengue cases from January to June, 2024
Apura revealed that two died of Dengue in Tagum City, among the total number of recorded cases in the first semester this year, and these were six years old and eight year old victims.
Dr. Mackno called on all Tagumenyos to sustain the consciousness of eliminating the breeding place of mosquitos by basically keeping their surroundings clean and free from stagnant waters.
“Unta mga Tagumenyos magtinabangay ta kay dili kaya sa City Health nga kami lang maglihok para sa dengue, he said. “ I-habit nato nga manglimpyo, kung naay makita nga mga tubig sa atong balay, ilabay nato kung dili na siya gamiton.,” he added.
[We hope that we Tagumenyos should be helping each other because the City Health cannot be moving alone for Dengue. Let’s make it a habit to clean up; once we see contained waters at home, let’s throw them away if we don’t intend to use them.]
Meanwhile Mackno wanted people to shed off the mentality of requesting for “misting” when dengue cases are monitored in their communities. He wanted them to be mindful of regular clean-up, instead.
“…kung naay kaso sa dengue magpa misting ‘mI. Murag wala na ang core gyod unsaon pagpatay sa Dengue which search and destroyo jud siya.
[If Dengue cases arise, they would then call for misting. It seems that the core to eliminate Dengue has been lost, that is search and destroy.] (JMDA /PIA XI)
