The Capital recorded a big uptick in cases of dengue over the past week (till September 28) with a total of 412 cases, pushing September’s caseload to 693, which is the highest that has been registered in the month in the last four years. The total number of dengue cases in the city this year now stands at 937.
Out of the past week’s total, 316 cases were recorded in areas governed by the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD), while 76 cases were marked ‘untraced after investigation’.
Cases where an infected patient has been identified but the details and address of the patient are not properly registered, are marked as ‘untraced after investigation’.
‘Cleared backlog’
“We have cleared a large chunk of backlog cases which were under investigation, which is the reason behind the spike seen in the report. It is likely that the peak in cases will be observed this month,” said a senior civic official.
Till September 21, the city had recorded 525 dengue cases. Of the city’s total of 937 cases, 306 have been recorded under the ‘untraced after investigation’ category.
Among the cases recorded in MCD zones, most cases have been recorded in the south Zone (63), followed by Najafgarh Zone (61), west Zone (58), central Zone (57) and Keshav Puram Zone (52).
The senior MCD official said the civic body continues to enforce all necessary measures to control mosquito breeding, adding that over 2.61 crore residential, commercial and other buildings have been checked for dengue since the beginning of this year.
Action against errants
“We detected mosquito breeding in over one lakh houses and office buildings. Over 96,000 legal notices were issued for the same. Our domestic breeding checkers have been doing their duties on a regular basis,” the senior MCD official added.
Last year, the city recorded 9,613 cases of dengue and 23 deaths, including over 2,900 cases marked ‘untraced after investigation’. It was the worst dengue outbreak in the city since 2015.
