Death toll from dengue fever in Pakistan reaches 337

2011-11-05 04:46:46 GMT+7 (ICT)

LAHORE, PAKISTAN (BNO NEWS) -- The death toll as a result of the continuing dengue fever outbreak in Pakistan has risen to more than 330, officials said on Friday. More than 30,000 people have been infected.

With four more deaths reported on Friday, the total number of fatalities has risen to at least 337. Health officials said 118 new cases of dengue fever were confirmed on Friday in Punjab's provincial capital of Lahore, which has been the most affected area.

With hundreds of new cases this week alone, nearly all of them in Lahore, the dengue fever outbreak has now affected at least 31,979 people in the country, including 20,399 in Punjab, of which 17,006 are in Lahore. Punjab Health Department officials told the Nation that 308 of the fatalities were in Punjab, including 268 in Lahore alone.

Although the death toll continues to rise rapidly and new cases are reported daily, health officials provided some positive news on Friday by saying at least 20,089 of the dengue fever patients have already been 'cured' and discharged from hospital.

Meanwhile, Health Secretary Jehanzeb Khan spoke at the King Edward Medical University on Friday, stating that despite the upcoming Eid-ul-Azha holidays, health departments and hospitals will continue to operate under normal hours due to the severity of the outbreak.

Several months ago, Sri Lankan specialists traveled to Pakistan to assist the regional government and found that many hospitals in Lahore had been contaminated, increasing the number of victims. Emergency health teams from the World Health Organization (WHO) arrived in Pakistan to help organize a strategy to fight the epidemic.

For weeks after the outbreak began, the virus seemed to be affecting people at a constant rate. The dengue fever virus is usually most active during the initial phases of the outbreak, but the situation did not follow the typical epidemic cycle and was not weakening. It eventually began to weaken.

Dengue spreads more often after the rainy season when stagnant water on the streets usually activate the breed of mosquitoes, causing dengue fever. Heavy monsoon rains in southeastern Pakistan have so far claimed the lives of some 300 people and displaced millions more.

-- © BNO News All rights reserved 2011-11-05

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