Coimbatore Corporation will soon engage 200 persons to control dengue.
The civic body was in the process of recruiting on a temporary basis the 200 persons, 100 of who would be men, to join the team of 800 domestic breeding checkers to fight dengue by destroying mosquito breeding sources, said officials.
The Corporation would group the 100 men into rapid response teams for deployment in areas where dengue cases were reported. The men would go door-to-door in neighbourhood of houses with dengue-positive cases to destroy mosquito breeding sources – those that stored fresh, rainwater where the dengue-causing Aedes aegypti mosquito bred.
The Corporation would also deploy the teams in dengue hotspots, the sources said and added that the civic body would deploy the other 100 workers for regular mosquito-control work.
This was necessary because the city had reported 120 dengue cases in November this year and was seeing an average of 10 – 15 cases a day. The city had also seen the death of a child to dengue on November 28.
Further, the city had dengue hotspots in Wards 36, 37, 40, 41, 42, 16, 17, 18, 97, 9, 86, 79, 71 and 72.
In those and other parts of the city, the workers to be engaged would also check for breeding sources in under-construction buildings, locked or unoccupied houses. They would also be visiting commercial establishments to check if discarded items had turned fresh water containers and mosquito breeding sources, the sources said.
In the recent past, the Corporation had engaged with various types of commercial establishment groups. In particular, it had asked traders engaged in vulcanising and puncture shops to ensure that disused tyres did not turn mosquito breeding sources.
In continuation of the effort, the civic body had seized three tonnes disused tyres, the sources added.
Home quarantine
Health wing officials said the civic body had placed in home quarantine 76 persons who had returned from high-risk countries where Omicron cases were reported.
The Corporation had let them exit the Coimbatore airport only after their first test result showed negative. After the eighth day of their arrival, the Corporation was collecting samples for a second test.
Thus far, none had turned COVID-19 positive and therefore it had not sent any sample for genome sequencing to identify if the virus variant was Omicron, the sources said.
Further, the Corporation was in daily touch over phone with the 76 persons to inquire about their health.