People from Tamil Nadu, who visited other States and returned home, are tested for fever since there are reports of swine flu and other diseases in other States.
Though there was presently no scare or reports of any major outbreak, the Department of Health had been conducting mass screening at different points, said Principal Health Secretary J. Radhakrishnan here on Saturday.
Speaking at a meeting-cum-expo on prevention of dengue fever, in which State Ministers C. Vijay Baskar, Natham R. Viswanathan and S. P. Velumani participated along with Collectors L. Subramanian (Madurai), T. N. Hariharan (Dindigul), N. Venkatachalam (Theni), K. Nanthakumar (Ramanathapuram) and T. Munusami (Sivaganga), he said that hill stations, including Kodaikanal and Udhagamandalam , had no cases of dengue fever.
Dr. Radhakrishnan said that similar expo-cum-awareness meets were held in Chennai, Tirunelveli and Karur recently. This was basically to sensitise the officials in district administration, who, in turn, should review the anti-dengue measures on a daily basis.
A mere two millimetre space was sufficient for mosquitoes, which spread dengue fever, to breed in stagnant water. Hence, it was important to ensure that there was no stagnation of water around, he said.
While the dengue fever was prevalent in 107 countries in the globe, as per WHO 99 per cent of the cases was curable, while one per cent ended in fatality.
In Tamil Nadu, the Health Secretary said that 1,500 government-run hospitals were put on alert mode to handle any emergency, leave alone fever.
Apart from the hospitals, anganwadi centres too had been instructed to provide papaya and nilavembu kashayam (concoction) to the needy people. Proper and early diagnosis would solve the problem at its nascent stage, he said.
The Collectors have been instructed to hold review meetings on a daily basis till February 15 with doctors and officials from Health Department.
