Dengue another health threat, says Dr Noor Hisham

PUTRAJAYA: As the Covid-19 crisis is slowly being brought under control in Malaysia, the Health Ministry cautions Malaysians to be ready to fight another health threat - dengue.

Health director-general Datuk Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said there has been an increasing number of dengue cases in the past few weeks.

"For the past six weeks, the number of dengue cases has seen an upward trend, in which there is an average increase of 8% every week," he said in his Covid-19 daily press briefing on Monday (June 8).

He cautioned that it is forecast there will be a second wave of dengue cases in early June, based on the trend of dengue cases over the last five years.

"As many more social, education, religious and business sectors are expected to be re-opened, there is a high possibility that such places which have long been closed and vacated would be at risk of becoming the mosquitoes' breeding ground," he said.

He said that there have been 84 dengue deaths so far this year and added that it was found that 11% of them were late in seeking treatment.

Dr Noor Hisham however noted that there had been an 11% decrease in the number of dengue cases compared to last year.

From the month of January to June 6 this year, there were 48,584 dengue cases compared to 54,524 cases in the same period last year.