Materia Medica Malaysiana

Health Director Talks On Strategies To Destroy Aedes Mosquitos

Vector surveillance, case surveillance, health education and promotion are the strategies to control and destroy aedes mosquito breeding.

Dr Zainol Ariffin bin Pawanchee, Director of Health in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, highlighted this at a session on diseases carried by mosquitoes at the health seminar yesterday.

The vector surveillance is to identify dengue sensitive areas, using mosquito larva trapping devices to decrease mosquito population in residential areas, create special anti-dengue epidemic control team in out-break areas and mobilise members of the community for aedes control.

Meanwhile, case surveillance is to determine occurrence of cases according to grid areas and to determine place of transmission such as residential, school, work place and others. Health promotion, on the other hand, is to determine the target groups and information for dissemination.

At the same session, Dr Siti Romlah binti Haji Mohammad Jais, Veterinarian Officer at the Agriculture Department, stressed on the danger of pets and livestock to human health.

She said the factors in preventing all such hazards are cleanliness for the animals and visits to the veterinarian at least once a month for health checkups.

At the session, it was also revealed that houses nowadays cannot guarantee 100 per cent safety to occupants.

Many types of accidents can happen at any time. For example, fire hazards caused by carelessness that can result in loss of properties and a place to stay, injuries and even death.

This was disclosed by Awang Osman Jailani, the Public Relations Officer of the fire services department, in his working paper entitled "Hazards in domestic setting".

He said every house should have a systematic plan to prevent fire and save lives during a fire.

Meanwhile, Dr. Pengiran Haji Khalifah, Acting Senior Medical Officer of the Health Work Practice Section, Ministry of Health, in his talk on "Workplace, health and safety", revealed that according to the 2003 Annual Report from the Occupational Health Division, 139 cases of accidents at work were reported during the period from June to December of last year.

He said the workplace should implement hazard controls. -- Courtesy of Borneo Bulletin