12 more die of dengue

Staff Reporter :
At least 12 more people died from dengue in 24 hours preceding 8:00am on Tuesday as the country grapples with a record outbreak of the mosquito-borne disease.

Of the 12 deaths, seven were reported in the capital.

At least 1,470 dengue patients were admitted to hospitals in the 24-hour period, according to a press release sent from Health Emergency Operation Centre and Control Room of the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) on Tuesday (November 14).

Of them, 319 were admitted to different hospitals in Dhaka, while 1,151 were admitted to different hospitals outside the Dhaka.

Dengue has so far claimed at least 1,496 lives this year and nearly 2,95,042 were infected, making this the deadliest year since the first recorded epidemic in 2000.

According to DGHS data, 5,905 dengue patients were undergoing treatment at different public and private hospitals across the country.

A total of 2,87,641 patients have so far been released from hospitals across the country this year. Of them, 1,04,227 have availed treatment in Dhaka and 1,90,815 outside Dhaka.

Hospitals in Dhaka are struggling to accommodate the large number of patients suffering high fever, joint pain, and vomiting, health officials said.

Meanwhile, Experts have blamed a prolonged monsoon and rising temperature, along with a lack of effective measures to kill the Aedes aegypti mosquito, the known carrier of the virus, for the outbreak.