<p>City health minister A K Walia is one of the busiest ministers in the Delhi government with official meetings, political functions, constituency problems and marriages to attend — all crammed in a day’s schedule. <br /><br />No wonder, when asked on the sidelines of one such function why dengue cases are on the rise, he looks quizzically at you as if the question has failed to register. <br /><br />After getting his facts and figures updated, Walia is ready with his reply. <br />“To say that dengue cases are rising is incorrect. They have crossed 2,000 so far, but if you take the average of the last five years, it would be in the range of these figures only.” <br /><br />On why the cases are not going down with the onset of winter, Walia says the department usually gets the report confirming the infection only eight days to two weeks after a patient has undergone a dengue test. </p>.<p>The cases that are coming to notice now have actually been reported about two weeks ago, says Walia. “It takes time between when a patient undergoes the test, hospital gets the positive result, and they send the report to the department. Then it is released to the media,” he says.</p>.<p>“When you are told that 30 new cases of dengue have been reported on Saturday, it means that these people were bitten by the dengue mosquito several days ago,” he says.</p>.<p>According to doctors in the field, he adds, the number of patients undergoing dengue tests in various hospitals has already gone down and will further dip in the next few days. <br /><br />He denies that the official figures are only half of the total number. “All hospitals, including private or government, are supposed to inform our department about the number of <br />dengue cases coming to them,” he says.<br /><br />“It could be that some hospitals do not report them punctually. But yes, we can say that the number of dengue cases that we release to the media is the only data which we have and no other data exists,” says Walia.</p>.<p>According to him, while the MCD is the implementing agency and primarily responsible for carrying out anti-mosquito measures like fogging, the overall responsibility is of Delhi government’s health department, which prepares the ‘action plan’ and issues guidelines for more efficiency. <br /><br />“Coordination activities between government and municipal hospitals, availability of platelets and enough staff in hospitals, and raising public awareness about dengue are all our responsibilities,” he clarifies.</p>
<p>City health minister A K Walia is one of the busiest ministers in the Delhi government with official meetings, political functions, constituency problems and marriages to attend — all crammed in a day’s schedule. <br /><br />No wonder, when asked on the sidelines of one such function why dengue cases are on the rise, he looks quizzically at you as if the question has failed to register. <br /><br />After getting his facts and figures updated, Walia is ready with his reply. <br />“To say that dengue cases are rising is incorrect. They have crossed 2,000 so far, but if you take the average of the last five years, it would be in the range of these figures only.” <br /><br />On why the cases are not going down with the onset of winter, Walia says the department usually gets the report confirming the infection only eight days to two weeks after a patient has undergone a dengue test. </p>.<p>The cases that are coming to notice now have actually been reported about two weeks ago, says Walia. “It takes time between when a patient undergoes the test, hospital gets the positive result, and they send the report to the department. Then it is released to the media,” he says.</p>.<p>“When you are told that 30 new cases of dengue have been reported on Saturday, it means that these people were bitten by the dengue mosquito several days ago,” he says.</p>.<p>According to doctors in the field, he adds, the number of patients undergoing dengue tests in various hospitals has already gone down and will further dip in the next few days. <br /><br />He denies that the official figures are only half of the total number. “All hospitals, including private or government, are supposed to inform our department about the number of <br />dengue cases coming to them,” he says.<br /><br />“It could be that some hospitals do not report them punctually. But yes, we can say that the number of dengue cases that we release to the media is the only data which we have and no other data exists,” says Walia.</p>.<p>According to him, while the MCD is the implementing agency and primarily responsible for carrying out anti-mosquito measures like fogging, the overall responsibility is of Delhi government’s health department, which prepares the ‘action plan’ and issues guidelines for more efficiency. <br /><br />“Coordination activities between government and municipal hospitals, availability of platelets and enough staff in hospitals, and raising public awareness about dengue are all our responsibilities,” he clarifies.</p>
