As the national capital reported the highest number of dengue cases in the last six years, the Delhi government in planning to launch a public awareness campaign after the conclusion of the G20 Summit which begins in the city tomorrow.
According to Delhi Health Minister Saurabh Bhardwaj, the public awareness campaign will be named as ‘'Ten weeks, Ten Minutes at Ten'.
“As soon as the G20 ends, we will launch a campaign (against dengue) — 'Ten weeks, Ten Minutes at Ten' — to enable residents to be wary of the risks and not store water as it aids the breeding of mosquitoes,” Bhardwaj said in a press conference on Wednesday.
The national capital has reported 243 dengue cases till July 28 this year, according to Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) data.
The Minister said that the hospitals have marked beds for the dengue patients and the details of such beds have been shared on public portals.
"For Dengue we have marked beds separately. The number of such beds has been shared on our public portals," Bhardwaj said.
Talking about the G20 Summit, he said that hospital beds and ICUs have been marked separately in case of any health emergency.
"For G20, we have marked beds, emergency spaces and ICUs to promptly address public health emergencies, if any," Bhardwaj said.
The situation of dengue in Delhi was hit this year by the flood situations in parts of the city caused due to overflowing of the Yamuna River, officials said.
The Aam Aadmi Party put the blame of the flooding on the BJP government in Haryana alleging that the release of water from the Hathnikund barrage resulted in the overflowing of Yamuna leading to floods in the national capital for days.
“A strike by the MCD staff tasked with checking the breeding of mosquitoes also worsened the dengue situation in the national capital this year,” the officials said.
(With ANI inputs)
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