A five-month-old baby has become the second to succumb to dengue in a week. The baby, Pujashri, from Annai Sathya Nagar in Greenways Road, Adyar, was admitted to Kanchi Kamakoti CHILDS Trust Hospital (KKCTH) in Nungambakkam on August 24.
She was declared dead on Thursday by the hospital. On August 24, another toddler had died of dengue at Mehta’s Hospital in Chetpet.
According to doctors in KKCTH, where the baby was admitted, the child had died of complications resulting from dengue. “The primary cause is dengue. There is enough serological evidence to show that the baby had dengue,” said a paediatrician at the hospital. He however added that this year, hospitals were reporting fewer dengue cases than in the past five years.
“We are seeing cases but less than those last year,” he added. According to him, the number of cases is lesser because the city has not received its usual quota of rain for this time of the year, he said.
According to data available with the Chennai Corporation, the number of dengue cases in the city had gone up over the past few days.
Last week, the civic body had recorded 299 cases of dengue. By Thursday, the officials said, 329 persons in the city had tested positive for the disease.
The Chennai Corporation plans to issue a notice to Kanchi Kamakoti CHILDS Trust Hospital under the Public Health Act for failing to report the dengue case.
Delay in reporting
Most of the hospitals that are part of the direct health reporting system of the Chennai Corporation continue to delay reporting cases of dengue, according to Corporation health officials.
Of the 585 hospitals that are part of the system, more than 50 per cent do not report the diseases regularly.
“The number of mosquitoes has increased in the past few weeks,” said V.K. Ragu, a resident of Annai Sathya Nagar. However, Corporation officials said that there was no reports of Aedes mosquito breeding in the locality.
