SHAH ALAM: The overwhelming lack of public support towards campaigns to eradicate the Aedes mosquito in Selangor has been identified as among the main causes behind the state's rise in dengue cases last month.
Selangor Health director Datuk Dr Zailan Adnan said that on average, 70 per cent of home owners at localities where dengue cases occur, refuse to give their cooperation to fogging activities.
"Apart from the current wet weather, which had contributed to the rise in dengue cases, the public also continues to be highly dependent on fogging exercises by the Health Department and local authorities (to fight Aedes mosquitoes).
"The public's attitude has not changed much when it comes to ridding Aedes breeding spots. There were also many home owners who refused to allow on-duty personnel from entering their house compounds to conduct checks and fogging.
"We also found that at several localities where dengue cases were reported, only about 30 per cent of home owners in the area were willing to cooperate by allowing fogging to be conducted inside their house compounds.
"Although the Health Department is allowed by law to enter house compounds by serving notice to their owners, the process would only delay efforts to control this problem," she said.
Dr Zailan said the Petaling and Hulu Langat districts have been identified as main localities where many dengue cases were recorded.
She said the department had ordered reinforcements by deploying teams from other districts to these two areas. However, resources are limited as the other districts also have to carry out dengue control operations at their respective areas.
Dr Zailan said the department is also collecting information to see if there are any serotype shifts occurring in Selangor, which would not only lead to a rise in cases, but also cause worse effects in the case of second time infections.
On Sunday, Health Ministry director-general Datuk Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah, in a statement, said the authorities had detected an increase in dengue cases in six states, namely Selangor, Perak, Kedah, Pahang, Penang and Kelantan in the first three weeks of this year.
Statistics attached with the statement showed Selangor topping the list of cases in the third week of January (Jan 15 to Jan 21) with 1,133 cases.
The ministry recorded a total of 2,053 dengue cases nationwide during that period, an increase of 9.43 per cent from 1,876 cases the previous week (second week of Jan).