An expert brought to Dominica in light of a local outbreak of the mosquito-borne disease, Chikungunya, is warning of a pandemic if the disease is not brought under control quickly.
“If it doesn’t get under control it is going to be another pandemic and it is going to be worst than Dengue,” Yale University entomoligst, Dr. Durland Fish, told Kairi FM’s Healthy Environs, Health People.
According to the World Health Organization a pandemic is the “worldwide spread of a new disease.”
“We need to have emergency measures to try to bring this epidemic under control and we have only a week or two to do that,” Fish said. “If we cannot contain this in two weeks we are going to wind up like Martinique and Guadeloupe.”
Officials say there has been a total of 13 confirmed cases of the disease in Dominica.
They say it was confined to Bath Estate and Woodfordhill but Chief Environmental Health Office, Anthony Scotland, said it is spreading across the island.
“The disease is spreading to several communities,” he told the same program on Kairi FM. “It has moved out of the major areas of Woodfordhill and Bath Estate. We have seen it in Scotts Head, Soufriere and Grandbay and a couple in Marigot.”
Scotland said there are reported cases in Kingshill, Goodwill, Roseau Central, Mahaut and Massacre.
He described Bath Estate as the ‘epicenter’ of the disease and said there has been some severe cases in a small section of Woodfordhill called Small Farm.
“We moved into Bath Estate,” he said. “We did a lot of work on the ground, working with the patients and the contacts and wider environment to see how we can stem the flow of that disease.”
Meanwhile the Public Health Agency of Canada has issued a travel notice to Canadians traveling to several Caribbean islands, including Dominica.
“There have been confirmed cases of chikungunya on the Caribbean islands of Saint Martin/St. Maarten, Dominica, Guadeloupe, Martinique, Saint-Barthélemy and the British Virgin Islands. These cases mark the first time that locally acquired transmission of chikungunya has been detected in the Region of the Americas,” the agency said in the travel notice.
The agency recommend that travellers to the islands take precautions, such as protecting themselves from mosquito bites — particularly during peak mosquito biting times in the early morning and late afternoon.
Chikungunya is a viral disease, carried mainly by the Aedes aegypti mosquito and causes a dengue-like sickness.
Symptoms include a sudden high fever, severe pain in the wrists, ankles or knuckles, muscle pain, headache, nausea and rash. Joint pain and stiffness are more common with Chikungunya than with dengue. Persons who have these symptoms are advised to report to the nearest health centre or their personal health care provider
The type of mosquito that transmits Chikungunya is also known to transmit dengue fever.
I hope that the school children in bath estate schools from harlem and elsewhere are protected from this disease. And if needs be have them transferred to a safer area since Bath estate is the main center. I do hope that Ambrose and St Jean and Timothy are listening.
There should be a massive program to spray the entire island…all that
money they wasting, use some to spray up the place nuh. Stupessssss
What step is the government taking to eradicating the problem ? that was not mention, what about spraying, educating the people in the affected area excetra.
there are many public service announcements even in chinese language, community meetings held in Bath Estate, not to mention National Pest did a superb job at spraying. Individual houses have been sprayed in the “the epic center”
We can fight this, we all have to play our part in controlling the spread of this virus. Keep your yard free of stagnant water, alert the Ministry of Health if you are experiencing the symptoms (see below). If you are diagnosed, or think that you have the virus, please do as much as you can to prevent yourself from getting bit by other mosquitoes. Get a mosquito net if possible, use mosquito repellent.
Symptoms:
Chikungunya is characterized by an abrupt onset of fever frequently accompanied by joint pain. Other common signs and symptoms include muscle pain, headache, nausea, fatigue and rash. The joint pain is often very debilitating, but usually lasts for a few days or may be prolonged to weeks.
http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs327/en/
All for one and one for all, Dominican Pride, love my country
We are keeping our yard try at all times. However, the drain in front of some houses does not flow of at all. Every morning we clean it with a broom but in the evening it is full of waste water again. The local village council is not doing anything to level the drains. Letters to the government remain unanswered! Did not really expect anything else.
I Pray that the appropriate authorities take prompt action to ensure that this new disease is rapidly brought under control with the help of friendly epidimeologists experts, and to ensure that continuing information is disseminated to the public on measures to eradicate the breeding ground of these mosquitoes.”A STITCH IN TIME SAVES NINE”.
this animalthat move about its underground animal if it prick you can go dead at the same time from since i was 16years of age i new this animal they cald it siealeboi
What exactly are you saying?
Excuse me, but what are you talking about? A mosquito is the cause of this disease, you know the insect, with 6 legs and wings?
The Mosquito is not a wood cutter…. siealebois.