Disease prevention and control chief Anya
Jantrakas leads the community-based Surveillance and Rapid Response Team
in a training seminar.
Warunya Thongrod
Buoyed by hospitals reporting no dengue fever cases for two weeks, the
Pattaya Public Health Department stepped up efforts to make the city a
“dengue-free zone” by educating more residents on how to eradicate
disease-carrying mosquitoes.
Disease prevention and control chief Anya Jantrakas led the
community-based Surveillance and Rapid Response Team in a training
seminar April 2 on how to spread the bug-abatement message city-wide.
The SRRT is made up of 50 individuals representing all of Pattaya’s 42
neighborhoods and works at the grassroots level to eradicate mosquitoes
and report dengue and other disease outbreaks.
“Every year, Pattaya city has dengue cases. Therefore, we have
campaigned for residents to use every method possible to control the
disease within manageable limits,” Anya said. “The SRRT Team is another
tool to monitor and report real-time disease conditions within one’s
neighborhood. Our working process covers all area and is efficient,
leading to rapid information transfer.”
One byproduct has been an absence of any dengue cases reported in the
past two weeks. If Pattaya can go four weeks without a case, it will be
designated a “dengue-free zone.”
City workers will be visiting South Pattaya’s Tukcom mall area soon to
investigate mosquito and larvae conditions there, Anya said.
In addition to dengue fever, the department is also warning Pattaya
residents to beware and report cases of diarrhea and H1N1 flu.
The diarrhea cases come largely from street food and dirty eating
utensils, Anya said. He cautioned buyers to cook food thoroughly to kill
germs and wash utensils and hands frequently.
As for H1N1, Thailand has seen 20 cases in 2014, double the number of
cases during the same time frame last year. Anya encouraged anyone
suffering flu-like symptoms to visit a doctor.
