Delhi adds 2,569 dengue cases, highest since 2015 outbreak

Dengue infection tally in Delhi almost doubled to 5,277 with over 2,500 new cases added in just one week ending November 13, according to the report released by the municipal corporations of Delhi.

This is the highest number of cases since Delhi’s largest outbreak in 2015 that affected almost 16,000 people and killed 60. In comparison, 4,431 cases were reported in the Capital a year later in 2016 and 4,726 cases in 2017, which continued to drop sharply to reach 2,798 cases in 2018 and 2,036 cases in 2019; which dropped further by nearly 50% in 2020, when only 1,072 infections were recorded.

Of the total cases this year, 3,740 cases were reported in November alone. Delhi usually sees dengue cases peak in October with the numbers falling by November as the temperature goes down. This year, however, due to the erratic and intermittent rainfall, hospitals are still reporting a large number of dengue cases.

The 100-bed fever ward at Lok Nayak hospital is always 80 to 90% full, with the hospital admitting 20 to 30 dengue patients every day, a senior doctor said on November 13.

No new dengue deaths were added to the toll in the last week. So far, the infection has killed nine city residents – six of who were children, according to data provided by the corporations, which are the nodal agencies for collecting data from city hospitals.

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The toll is the highest since 2017 when 10 deaths due to the infection were recorded in the city. So far, the expert death audit committee has examined 34 deaths reported by city hospitals in September and October, of which, nine were confirmed to have been caused due to dengue contracted in Delhi.

In October, Delhi government made it mandatory for all hospitals, clinics, and diagnostic centres to report every case of dengue, malaria, chikungunya, and any other vector-borne disease under the epidemic diseases act. This is likely to have added to the numbers since many health institutions didn’t use to report their cases earlier.