Spread of New Viral Fever Reported in Five States

High incidence of a rare form of viral fever spread by mosquitoes has been reported in five states, Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare Panabaka Lakshmi said Friday.

"High incidence of fever cases with arthralgia were reported from 18 districts of Andhra Pradesh, 27 district of Karnataka, 31 districts each of Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu and four districts of Madhya Pradesh," Lakshmi told the Rajya Sabha.

She informed the house that 66,109 cases of suspected 'Chikungunya' fever had been reported in Andhra Pradesh as compared to 543,286 in Karnataka, 202,114 in Maharashtra, 41,211 in Tamil Nadu and 43,784 in Madhya Pradesh.

She said the government had deputed teams consisting of epidemiologist, public health specialists, microbiologists and entomologists for assessment of the situation and providing technical assistance and guidelines to these state.

She also said that the states had been provided the larvicides and pyrethrum extract for fogging.

(Source: IANS)