Vadodara Mahila Congress submits memo to VMC Mayor over spread of Dengue

Today in Vadodara, raising concern over spread of Dengue in the city, Ami Ravat, President of Vadodara Mahila Congress supported by women of Gujarat Congress at Vadodara submitted a memorandum to the Mayor of  VMC (Vadodara Municipal Corporation) office located at Khaderao market  for declaring Dengue epidemic in Vadodara and take adequate measures to control dengue by addressing breeding spots and awareness.

Memorandum stated that the current heath situation of the city is alarming, more than 1000 cases of dengue reported are tested positive and 18 deaths have been reported due to Dengue, which is highest so far. The incidence rates of other vector borne disease is also very high.

We would like to draw your attention to the fact that this worst situation is not due to seasonal rainfall alone but a series of wrong decision taken by the administration after you had taken charge as Mayor is responsible.

1. Entire paramedical staff of almost 1800 involved in Intra-domestic work and Malaria –Failaria department was removed suddenly on 31^st December,2015
2. The above staff included trained personals with more than 10 years of experience and 100% of staff involved in intra-domestic work was removed from duty, VMC had spent lacs on training this staff, with so many years of experience they very fully aware of the breeding spots and hence were effective.
3. Even if qualified staff was to be taken smartness would have been in slowly phasing out the old staff and retain the good ones.
4. Secondly the earlier staff involved in intra-domestic work included female workers alone and they had an easy access to the households but the new staff taken in August 2016 is of males and they are not allowed by many, further they are new to the city and unaware of geography and not trained hence cannot perform as effectively.
5. The larvacides and other medicines procured were substandard, all the routine procedures are bypassed in procurement, today VMC has filed a charge sheet against its Health Officer Dr Devesh Patel, an inquiry is pending for the same, what can be worst

than suspension of a health officer in charge of procurement who is being solely blamed ,whereas as entire system which allowed this procurement, forgoing all procedures is responsible a vigilance inquiry should be done in this matter. This again reflects administrative failure.

6. In short Malaria Failaria department was totally inactive from January to August 2016 due to lack of staff and inadequate procurements.
7. From engineering department too, most of the storm water drains are not cleaned properly, they are water logged even in summer and officially many connections are permitted in storm water drains.
8. The Side Kerbs of roads of all newly carpeted roads are water logged and are potential breeding places.
9. The houses constructed under BSUP and JNNURM are of pathetic conditions, there is water logging on terraces and around their premises.

On one side the Administration is busy organizing Happy streets and planning for Smart city (90 % of which is restricted to one small area of City, with a mere budget of 100 crores per annum against more than 3600 crore annual budget of VMC) while on other side the city is suffering from outbreaks of Disease due to poor basic infrastructure facilities. How can a city where 18 people die of Dengue and thousands suffer from malaria and Dengue be labeled smart.

Instead of spending crores on superficial beautification for dedication of already constructed Airports and visit of dignitaries. The same fund should be utilized for long term steps to control Mosquito breeding places and creating awareness and community participation.

The thousand positive cases that are recorded is tip of the iceberg, another thousand go unreported, Please ensure that your monitoring mechanism is such that data from private hospitals also flows in, so that you get an exact scenario of outbreak. Your review meetings are based on incomplete data, how can you take correct measures if the monitoring mechanism itself is fault and does not bring out clear picture. We demand that a white paper is published on status of health of the city and Vadodara is dengue epidemic is declared in the city.