September tally for malaria, dengue cases lowest in five years, shows SDMC data

New Delhi: This September, Delhi recorded the lowest number of malaria and dengue cases, compared to the same month in the last five years, as per data released by the South Delhi Municipal Corporation's Anti-Malaria Operations, which maintains this data for the Capital. As of September 19, Delhi has recorded 535 cases of vector-borne diseases (malaria, dengue, and chikungunya) this year. Of these, 213 cases were of malaria, 255 cases of dengue and 67 cases of chikungunya.

Comparing data compiled by the SDMC for the month of September in 2015 and 2020, one sees a drastic decrease in the number of vector-borne diseases, from 6,860 cases in September 2015 to 178 cases this month. The sharpest nosedive was in the number of Dengue cases.

Delhi had 6,775 Dengue cases in September 2015, but the number is down to just 94 cases for this month.

Moreover, while the number of Malaria cases in the Capital reduced from 84 in September 2015 to 64 in September 2020, the number of chikungunya cases went up from a single case then to 20 cases now.

For this past week, from September 12 to 19, the Capital recorded 95 cases in total, of which 30 were Malaria, 55 Dengue, and 10 were of Chikungunya.

A sector-wise breakdown of this data set reveals that, for Malaria, the NDMC (New Delhi Municipal Council) recorded two cases in 2020, SDMC recorded 33, North Delhi Municipal Corporation recorded 26, East Delhi Municipal Corporation recorded 42 and 110 cases were miscellaneous.

Similarly, for dengue, in 2020, the NDMC recorded 17 cases, the SDMC recorded 58, North Delhi Municipal Corporation recorded 41 cases, East Delhi Municipal Corporation recorded 10 and 129 cases were of miscellaneous origin.

As for chikungunya, this year, the NDMC had three cases, the SDMC had seven, the North Delhi Municipal Corporation recorded nine cases, the East Delhi Municipal Corporation recorded three cases and 45 cases were of unknown origin in the city.

Moreover, action taken to control and tests for these vector-borne diseases this year included: 21,706 blood slide examinations to test for malaria, and more than 6,50,000 houses sprayed with insecticide to kill mosquitoes and mosquito larvae. Over 1,48,20,000 house visits were done by Domestic Breeding Checkers (DBCs) in the Capital, of which 67,882 houses tested positive for mosquito larvae.

The MCDs have also issued 52,125 legal notices this year and launched prosecution for 4,571 of those.