Dominican Republic and Jamaica: Malaria Updates
By Larry Habegger | Permalink |
2 comments | February 1st, 2007 | Trackback
Canadian health officials are urging Canadians traveling to the Dominican Republic to take precautions against malaria following three recent cases of the disease in returning travelers. The cases occurred in visitors to resorts in the province of La Altagracia. The best protection is to avoid being bitten by mosquitoes, but Canada’s public health agency recommends that all travelers to rural areas of the country and La Altagracia province take chloroquine as a preventive. In Jamaica, officials announced Jan. 25 that the island’s first malaria outbreak in 40 years has ended. Some 237 cases were confirmed after the disease appeared in October, most in greater Kingston.
Comments
[…] Worldtravelwatch.com, in a Malaria Update published on February 01st, 2007 cited unnamed Jamaica officials as announcing on January 25th that the Malaria Outbreak, the first in the country for 40 years, had ended. I thought that was an incredulous revelation since it was a well-established fact that as the testing of the blood slides - over 6,000 according to the Ministry of Health website - continued, more and more cases of the disease were being confirmed. […]
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Worldtravelwatch.com, in a Malaria Update published on February 01st, 2007 cited unnamed Jamaica officials as announcing on January 25th that the Malaria Outbreak, the first in the country for 40 years, had ended. I thought that was an incredulous revelation since it was a well-established fact that as the testing of the blood slides - over 6,000 according to the Ministry of Health website - continued, more and more cases of the disease were being confirmed.
World Travel Watch was wrong as evidenced by a Jamaica Gleaner report published on Friday, February 02nd, in which the Ministry of Health gave a new figure of 278 confirmed Malaria cases, 91 of which were identified last January month alone.
Granted, the rate of infection has slowed in the past few weeks. However, that does not signify that the outbreak has run its course. At the peak of the outbreak, there was a 5% positive reading. However, according to Dr. Sheila Campbell-Forrester just recently, the daily rate of infection was reduced to a 3% positive reading for all slides.
Thus, the number of malaria cases is still on the rise in Jamaica. Radiojamaica.com reported on Saturday, January 20 that the total number of infected cases was up to 248. Then the jamaicaobserver.com, in an article entitled “Malaria Hits Greenwich Town” published online Wednesday, January 24 and citing Minister of Information and Development Donald Buchanan, made the startling announcement that the Malaria Outbreak had spread from the originally affected areas of Trench Town, Denham Town, Tivoli Gardens and Delacree Park to Greenwich Town and Clarendon.