Hyderabad: Civic teams launch operations to check vector-borne diseases

Hyderabad: With the rains here, the threat of seasonal diseases are more than ever. And that is on top of a steadily rising number of Covid-19 cases. To contain the spread of vector-borne diseases in the city, a series of measures are already underway with the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) deploying 2,375 staffers to work on vector control operations.

Presently, weekly anti-larval operations are being taken up with 642 teams as per the Pin Point Programme (PPP). As a part of this programme, residential localities are being inspected and places inside houses identified as mosquito breeding points are being treated with larvicides. In houses where dengue and malaria cases were reported, Pyrethrum was sprayed indoors and fogging was done to prevent further transmission.

These measures taken up by the corporation are in addition to the deployment of fogging machines in different parts of the city. Two portable fogging machines have been allotted to every ward and two vehicle mounted fogging machines have been allotted to every GHMC circle. Trackers have been installed on 64 vehicle-mounted fogging machines and 10 portable fogging machines to monitor the distance covered. “While the portable fogging machines should cover at least 2 km every day i.e. 45 minutes to 1 hour, the vehicle mounted fogging machines should cover at least 18 km every day i.e., 2.5 hours to 3 hours,” a GHMC official said.

The Entomology Wing of the GHMC is also attending to mosquito menace complaints reported by people through the MyGHMC App, e-mails, Twitter, through 040-21111111- GHMC’s Help Line Number, corporators, elected representatives and Resident Welfare Associations.

After the corporation was unable to uniformly spray chemical in lakes to destroy mosquito larvae by deploying staff, drones were pressed into service to spray the chemicals. In addition to this, six mosquito trap machines have been installed for identification of mosquito density and species. Based on the data related to mosquito density and species, anti-larval operations, measures to control adult mosquitoes, information, education and communication (IEC) campaigns and other activities are planned. GHMC requested people to keep the premises of houses clean and support the civic body in containing seasonal diseases.