No Chikungunya cases reported in over a month, say officials

Madurai: The district health department has clarified that chikungunya infection is now completely under control and that no new case has been reported for the last one month and a half. This follows the outbreak of the viral infection in certain pockets of Madurai in February and March.
However, officials said the department was still on alert and conducting continuous fever surveillance to ensure there was no more transmission of the infection.The sources said that there was an outbreak at three locations – T Ramanathapuram, M Subbulapuram and Sedapatti. More than 150 suspected chikungunya as well as other “mixed infections” were reported during February-end and March. “While this number may seem high, these were only suspected cases and other kinds of fever may also have been included in it. The cases that were confirmed to be chikungunya came up to 15 – five each at the three locations,” another official in the health department said. He added that some people had other infections – including leptospirosis – along with chikungunya and hence were considered mixed infections.
The officials said that they were able to restrict the transmission of the disease significantly by acting immediately, and that since the start of April, no fresh cases were reported. Deputy director of health services (DDHS), Madurai district, K V Arjun Kumar said that the soaring temperature was also helpful in a way in curbing the disease as it was not a conducive environment for mosquitoes to breed. “Right from involving domestic breeding checkers (DBC) and conducting house-to-house surveys where the cases were reported to conducting fogging operations and destroying the larvae, multiple measures were carried out,” he said. Dr Arjun said that due to the prevalence of mixed infection, activities like overhead tank cleaning, checking for chlorination, addressing pipeline leakages and other steps were undertaken.
The officials, meanwhile, said that fever surveillance was being conducted intensively and that if there were cases of even general fever reported, they would conduct a check in that particular area to rule out chikungunya transmission.