AGARTALA, Sept 19 (TIWN): Tripura Pradesh Cong. released data on malaria outbreak through a press meet at Congress Bhawan on Saturday and disclosed the datas on the Visit of NVBDCP team to Tripura during year 2014.

According to the data, the state of Tripura is presently having a falciparum malaria outbreak. Cong spokeman Ashok Sinha told media that in total of 51,827 fever cases (including from OPD, IPD, and health camps) have been reorted till 26^th June 2014. Of these 8,313 (16%) are malaria positive.

 The districts of Dhalai, Gomati and South are worst affected. Till 26^th June 2014 a total of 52 fever related deaths have been reported by the state from 4 districts (38, 73.1 % Dhalai, 7 from North, 5 from South and 2 from Khowai).

Of the total, 27 (51.9 %) deaths occurred in the field (i.e. patients did not reach health facility), 28 (53.8% deaths) are amongst females while 39 (75.0 %) are among chldren less than 10 years.

Cong. alleged that the outbreak has become extensive mainly due to a system failure from top to bottom (ASHAs to State Health Society and beyond). As evidences, Cong also brought few examples:1) Early warnings signals were missed in 2^nd wk of May 2014 in District Dhalai, 2) DDT spray had been delayed, 3) Inedequate manpower due to unusual delay in recruitment of NVBDCP contractual staff, 4) Poor Monitoring and Supervision mainly due to lack of mobility support.

Cong. also demanded few basic necessaries: 1)Making available the diagnosis and Treatment facilities at community level through ASHAs, MPWs and Sub-centres, 2) Intensive IEC / BCC campaign to enhance the community awareness to maximally cover the bosy parts and using the bed nets during nights and ofcourse 3) Good monitoring and supervision to ensure effective implementation of preventive and control measures.

Harekrishna Bhowmik, Cong leader along with Cong. spokeperson Ashok Sinha was also present over there.