Dengue virus claims four more lives in Peshawar

PESHAWAR: Dengue fever on Wednesday took four more lives in Peshawar and infected 423 people in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, the provincial Health Department has confirmed.

With the latest four deaths which is the highest human losses after outbreak of dengue virus in the province, death toll from the mosquito-borne disease reached 25.

According to the Dengue Response Unit (DRU), all the four people died of dengue virus belonged to Peshawar where the virus was first reported in July this year.

Those died of dengue virus were identified as Nadir Khan son of Miro Khan of Pishtakhara union council.

He was 40 years old and was admitted to the Hayatabad Medical Complex (HMC) on September 9 with dengue fever.

 The second patient, Pervez Khan son of Nazar Gul, also died in HMC.

He was 45 years old and was taken to the hospital on September 10.

The third patient died in the Khyber Teaching Hospital (KTH).

The deceased was identified as Mislima daughter of Pervez Khan. She was 45 years old and was the resident Shaheen Muslim Town in Peshawar and was admitted to the hospital on September 7 but couldn’t recover.

A patient died in the Lady Reading Hospital (LRH) was identified as Mir Taj wife of Ziarat Gul. She was the resident of Kohat Road in Peshawar and was taken to the hospital on September 12.

Meanwhile, 1832 patients were taken to different hospitals in the province and the majority of them were suffering from high fever, headache and muscular pain, the symptoms close to dengue fever.

After their screening, 423 patients were diagnosed with dengue positive and only 382 of them were able to get beds in the hospitals.

The three tertiary care hospitals in Peshawar are over burdened with the dengue patients. KTH again received the majority of dengue patients as compared to LRH and HMC. The hospital received 1170 patients and after their screening, 287 were tested dengue positive.

HMC received 175 patients and 53 were tested dengue positive after their screening was done in the hospital.

LRH got 293 patients and found 44 of them suffering from dengue virus.

Besides these hospitals, some other public and private medical facilities also received a large number of patients and diagnosed some of them dengue positive.

And besides Peshawar, other districts also reported positive cases. Mansehra reported 13 cases, the Bacha Khan Medical Complex in Swabi six cases, Buner four and Abbotabad tested three patients dengue positive.