The Georgetown City Council will over the next two months, intensify the provision of routine environmental and health services as it joins the fight to prevent a dengue fever outbreak in Guyana.
As part of these efforts, the council will be hosting a cleanup of central Georgetown tomorrow.
The Caribbean Public Health Agency (CARPHA) recently warned that a major outbreak of dengue is possible. According to CARPHA, disease modelling predicts that another regional outbreak of dengue, similar to one which occurred in 2009, may occur in the near future. It said that the outbreak of dengue in Jamaica has elevated the level of concern in other Caribbean states and, therefore, advised countries to implement enhanced measures to reduce mosquito breeding and prevent the spread of disease.
Dr Suzette Reynolds, the newly-appointed city Medical Officer, stressed at a press conference on Thursday that true eradication of the mosquito which transmits dengue depends on the lifestyle practices of citizens, but council will be doing its part.
“We can have so many chemicals, so many cans, and so many persons on the ground trying to do their best but then the rest would be up to us [citizens]. Some people have the habit of discarding things they don’t use at the back of their home…that’s the exact breeding ground for mosquitos,” Reynolds said.
The City Council, she said, will be streamlining the efforts of three different departments, City Health, Vector Control, and Solid Waste, to do its part.
“The work we intend to do over the next month to two months is nothing strange to the Department. It is just that now we are incorporating other departments, such as the Solid Waste team, to come on board to help us with the massive cleanup. We are tying in many things normally done in a different way. It is my belief that the same resources used to do routine work in the [council’s] Vector Control department will be directed to this venture,” she explained, while pointing out that the only difference is that the objective is the prevention of dengue.
Fumigation is set to start next Wednesday in central Georgetown and will be expanded to other areas of the municipality each day for as long as resources last. In addition, city health and environmental workers will be visiting schools to educate persons about actions they can take to aid in prevention efforts.
As to how much resources are available for the effort, the acting Town Clerk Sharon Harry-Munroe could not say. In response to repeated questions on the issue, Harry-Munroe said that the council “would have some amount of expenditure but it wouldn’t be a lot.”
She stressed that the council would be seeking to work with both members of the business community and various government ministries but indicated that no efforts have yet been made to solicit that support.
