254 dengue cases in child hospital this year, health dept continues to cite 26 as total number

NOIDA: While the number of dengue cases being reported in the child hospital is increasing day by day, the health department is still under reporting the number with a stark difference between the number of dengue cases being reported.

According to officials of the super speciality paediatric hospital and post graduate child hospital (SSPHPGTI), as many as 254 cases of children affected with the disease have been reported in the year 2017 with as many as 147 patients having been diagnosed with the disease in October alone.

This is the highest number of cases disclosed by a hospital in the district officially.
Even as the rainy season has passed, the dengue cases have not shown any decrease with the hospital reporting as many as 147 dengue cases in October so far.

According to officials, the number is higher than the previous year and there has been a sudden surge in the number of dengue cases in October.

"We have had a sudden surge in the dengue cases in October. The number should ideally decrease in November but we can't predict if it will be so as we continue to get more patients," Dr Sumi Nandwani, professor and HOD, Microbiology, SSPHPGTI, Sector 30 told TOI.

While SSPHPGTI conducts its own eliza test (NS1 Antigen and IGM Eliza or MAC-Eliza) which is the test recognised by the World Health Organisation (WHO), the health department is still not taking these numbers into account, a fact clear from the numbers they cite.
District malaria officer Rajesh Sharma said that the total number of dengue cases reported in the hospitals of the district is 26, a number which they cited on October 6 too- fifteen days ago.

While officials claim to have started taking cognisance of the cases being reported in the child hospital after media reports suggesting that they were under reporting of cases, the number of cases suggests another story.

"Clearly, lack of hygiene and proper sanitation is the reason for breeding of mosquitoes," said a doctor in the child hospital.

The child hospital has been sending the details of the confirmed cases to officer incharge of the Integrated Disease Surveillance Programme (IDSP) who sits in the premises of the chief medical officer's office in Sector 39 every week.

Interestingly, while the health department does not take samples for the child hospital which is a government post graduate institute too, they seek samples for the suspected cases of dengue from the private hospitals- most of which conduct eliza test these days.

These samples then undergo an eliza test in the district hospital of Sector 30. However, the department does not inform the concerned private hospital about the number of how many of those samples resulted in positive or negative by an eliza test.

A spokesperson for a private hospital in Noida told TOI that the department does not share those details with them.