Eradication of mosquitoes hampered as country runs low on required pesticides

By Rathindra Kuruwita  

Sri Lanka was running out of chemicals used to control the mosquito population, Director of the National Dengue Control Unit (NDCU) Sudath Samaraweera said on Monday (02).

NDCU identified Colombo, Gampaha, Kalutara, Kandy, Galle, Matara, Jaffna, Batticaloa, Trincomalee, Kalmunai, Puttalam, Ratnapura and Kegalle districts as areas that are at high risk for dengue.

Samaraweera said that they were running low on pesticides used to destroy mosquito colonies.

“We have informed the Ministry of this situation. The Ministry said it would try to provide adequate stocks as soon as possible,” Samaraweera said, adding that there had been a 22.6 percent increase in reported dengue cases during the last week of April, compared to the third week of the same month.

“47.3 percent of the reported cases were from the Western Province,” he said.

Head of the Public Health Inspectors Union (PHIU), Upul Rohana has told the media that they have run out of chemicals used to control mosquitoes.

The Public Health Inspectors carry out dengue eradication activities at the grassroots.

“Cases are rising especially in the Northern and Western provinces,” he told the media.

Rohana said that they were also facing shortages of fuel and materials needed to carry out full blood count tests to identify dengue patients.

He said that they had detected 17,123 dengue cases during the first three months of 2022. “This is nearly half of the total cases reported in 2021 (35,924).”

The PHIU Head said the number of dengue infections and fatalities would increase soon as dengue eradication and testing programmes had been badly disrupted.