Palike sets up response team to curb H1N1

The BBMP on Wednesday formed a Rapid Response Team (RRT) to tackle the alarming increase of H1N1 cases in the city.

The civic body also sounded a high alert in all its eight zones, as Bengaluru topped the list of 584 cases tested positive to the disease, reporting 99 cases so far. With 60 cases, Shivamogga comes second in the list of H1N1 cases.

Alarmed by the rapidity of the outbreak, BBMP commissioner N Manjunath Prasad and health officer Dr Manoranjan Hegde held a meeting to device plans to mitigate the spread of the H1N1 flu.

As on Wednesday, about 10 people have succumbed to the disease, majority of them in Bengaluru hospitals.

Sources in the BBMP told DH that the RPTs will be deployed at the zonal level. They would work in unison with the health officials to find out fresh cases and cure them in the early stages.

"The RRTs will be headed by the health officer of the respective ward, comprising four other officials. This team will visit the areas where H1N1 cases have been detected and take up precautionary measures, besides administering treatment to patients," a senior BBMP official privy to the meeting told DH.

Last week, BBMP and corporation officials told Deputy Chief Minister G Parameshwara that things are under control. But with two more deaths, the civic body is waking up to the starker reality.

Meanwhile, Commissioner of Health and Family Welfare, Pankaj Kumar Pandey, on Wednesday held a video conference with all the district health officers to assess the situation.

"In Karnataka, an increasing trend of H1N1 was noticed since the first week of September, and till October 16, as many as 542 cases have tested positive," a senior health official said.

"District-level co-ordination committees have been formed in all districts comprising the deputy commissioner and CEOs to oversee activities to prevent H1N1," the official added.

A five-bedded ward has also been earmarked to isolate and treat H1N1 cases in all the district and taluk-level offices. Health care providers treating H1N1 have been provided with vaccines.

Two more succumb to H1N1 strain

Two people, one inside the BBMP limits and the other in Bengaluru Urban, fell victims to the Influenza A (H1N1) strain. The latest casualties have brought the number of H1N1 deaths in the state to 10 since January.

The latest update suggests that about 584 people have tested positive to the flu out of the 5,348 swab samples tested.

Bengaluru tops the list with 99 cases, followed by Shivamogga (60), Bengaluru Urban (58) and Chikkamagaluru (35).

The health department has been holding extensive awareness programmes to educate the general public, and government and private hospitals on the line of treatment to be given to the suspected cases.