CCMC, health dep't told to account funds

Cebu City Councilor Gerardo Carillo is asking the officials of the Cebu City Medical Center and City Health Department to liquidate the P8 million granted to them in the campaign against dengue last year.

“Maayo tingali nga ang mga hingtungdang opisyal mohimo usa og proper accounting kon giunsa nila sa paggasto ang kwarta nga gigahin alang sa pagpamalit og mga chemical,” Carillo said yesterday.

Carillo also supported the move to declare the entire city under a state of disaster preparedness so it can allocate funds to purchase the reagents, medicine, and chemicals to fight dengue, which claimed the lives of 52 persons last year.

It was Dorenda Macasucol, assistant chief of the City Epidemiology Statistics and Surveillance Unit, who made the letter request on behalf of city health officer Fe Cabugao.

Macasucol said the reagents that were purchased by the city last year to determine whether a person has been afflicted with dengue is already depleting and should be replenished.

Carillo, also the concurrent action officer of the City Disaster Coordinating Council, explained that he is concerned about how to reduce the number of dengue cases last year.

But to erase doubts from the public, he said health officials should also make an accounting of the funds.

Macasucol said the city should not be lax in the fight against dengue considering that, while there were dengue cases last year, the number of casualties was high.

The number of dengue cases in 2007 reached to 2,200 but there were only 53 deaths. While the dengue cases went down to 1,260 last year, there were 52 casualties.

Macasucol said that the statistics showed that for every 100 dengue cases, four to five of them died.

Persons with high fever will be subjected to a platelet and hematocrit tests to determine whether they have been afflicted with dengue.

Symptoms include fever, severe headache, joint pains and skin rashes. It would be fatal if the blood would become sticky because it could no longer circulate to the brain. — Rene U. Borromeo/LPM   (THE FREEMAN)