Rains begin: rearm versus dengue anew

So debilitating and deadly, dengue is one of the most researched tropical diseases. The Aedes Aegypti mosquito spreads it wide in the northern half of South America, the central belt of Africa, and all of Asia. Resultant high fever and lost blood platelets downed 87,409 Filipinos in 2010 and 63,741 in 2011, with corresponding 586 and 373 fatalities. Four in five patients were aged 1 to 20 years, of both genders, rich and poor.

Having identified most of patients as of school age, state officials combat the menace right in schoolhouses. The Department of Health encourages the installation of chemical-laced window and door screens. Effective for five years, the nets kill the insects and keep them out of classrooms. For good measure, the science and education departments are distributing 81,000 O/L (ovicidal/larvicidal) kits. Costing only P15 apiece, the kit is actually a small black piece of wood treated with a type of pepper and dipped in water in a black tumbler. Black is said to attract egg-laying mosquitos. The simple weapons probably accounted for the significant 27-percent drop in dengue cases from 2010 to 2011.

Only the female dengue-carrying mosquito bites, usually from dawn to mid-morning and mid-afternoon to dusk. Dengue fever has four strains, sero-1 to -4, with 2 and 3 the most prevalent during the rainy season, most conducive for the Aedes Aegypti to multiply. Zamboanga City, however, is registering of late an alarming rise in sero-4 cases. Health assistant secretary for epidemiology Eric Tayag worries that even past victims could get infected because yet un-immune to the rare strain. Researchers are verifying, meanwhile, if the Aedes Aegypti, that lays eggs in clean stagnant water, has adapted to filthy clogged canals. Citing studies at the U.P.-Los Baños, an entomologist group is warning that the night-biting Aedes Albopictus female mosquito too has become a dengue spreader. Whether Aegypti or Albopictus, the female lives about two weeks, and lays hundreds of eggs. Unchecked, that one blood-sucking dengue (and malaria) spreader multiplies exponentially to millions in a year.

Not taking any chances, local officials are trying out other dengue preventions. Some provincial governors and city mayors are trying out a larvicide invented in Texas, the US state with highest dengue incidence, and now mass-produced in Malaysia and the Philippines. Called mousticide to distinguish it from other mosquito larvae killers, it is safe if ingested by larvae eating insects and animals (dragonflies, fish, bats) and humans. The chemical is soaked in palay husk (ipa) that floats on water and kills only mosquito wrigglers at the surface of stagnant ponds or rainwater in roof gutters and flowerpots. A team from U.P.-Manila has conducted studies on lethal efficacy, and Malaysian philanthropist-prince Tunku Naquiyuddin reportedly is arriving in Manila to help finance the anti-dengue drive.

The war against dengue is all-out, health and science bureaucrats declared in late 2010. Another season of rains is coming up, along with the usual dengue epidemic. Whether or not equipped with larvicides in nets, tumblers and ipa, barangay leaders must mobilize their constituents for the war. Residents need to check their dwellings and workplaces to drain dark or bright, big or small spots where water accumulates: fridge pans, old tires, storm drains, garden fonts, indoor vases, everywhere.

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For a while there, things were turning rosy for Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak. His approval ratings have risen to 69 percent, he learned to deliver coherent political messages, and his 55-year reigning UMNO party was consolidating behind him. He seemed ready to call for overdue national elections, by June perhaps.

But the past has a way of creeping up to politicians and ruining their day. In Najib’s case, it is not only the UMNO’s repressiveness that became hot topic anew, after police tear-gassed a students’ assembly last week. The murder too of a Mongolian socialite in Kuala Lumpur in 2006, linked to then-defense minister Najib’s purchase of two French submarines in 2002, has resurfaced in the news.

The controlled mainstream press has strived to ignore the events. But Malaysians are gobbling up what’s happening from small opposition organs and global Internet news. The French government, which began investigating the defense contracting giant DCNS in 2009, has provided 153 documents to Kuala Lumpur human rights group Suaram. From the papers, it appeared that not only Najib’s close aide and security adviser Abdul Razak Baginda was involved in a $40-million kickback from the $1-billion submarine deal. Boss Najib must have been too, given his signed instructions to the French supplier.

The damning page showed that Najib, as defense chief, demanded payment “for the stay in France” of Perimekar Ltd, Baginda’s wholly owned front company. The instructions were seen to mean Najib wanted kickbacks for Perimekar’s negotiating the submarine supply in behalf of his defense ministry.

After the contract was inked in 2002 Najib, Baginda and Mongolia-born interpreter Altantuya Shaaribuqin toured France in a sports car. In 2006 Altantuya reportedly demanded her share of the released kickback, and picketed Baginda’s house when the latter’s jealous wife forbade payment. Two Najib bodyguards, lent to Baginda, abducted the pregnant woman and burnt her in the forest with military explosives. Confessing to the crime, they were convicted in 2009. Baguinda escaped punishment and migrated to England; Najib by then had become PM.

The revived controversy, coupled with calls for civil liberties and workers benefits, are seen to boost opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim’s bid for parliament victory.

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I confess. Exposés: Investigative Reporting for Clean Government almost was titled The Futility of Exposés. The compilation of my selected Gotcha columns on the biggest scams in recent years is available at National Bookstore and Powerbooks.

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Catch Sapol radio show, Saturdays, 8-10 a.m., DWIZ, (882-AM).

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