BATTLING THE DISEASE: Malaria patients at the Civil Hospital in North Lakhimpur, 400 km from Guwahati, on Thursday. — PHOTO: RITU RAJ KONWAR

Lakhimpur (Assam): Five-year-old Asorit Kishpota, Jacob Lagon (28) and Pushpalata Gogoi (39) of Laluk, 22 km from this district headquarters town, were diagnosed as having been affected with plasmodium falciparum before the disease claimed their lives.

However, like scores of others in this district, where the epidemic has broken out, they did not figure in the official list of 40 malaria deaths in Lakhimpur or 86 fatalities in Assam.

The reason, explains health officials, is that the norms of the National Vector Borne Disease Control Programme stipulate that only those casualties, where the occurrence of plasmodium falciparum is confirmed by an analysis of blood slides, can be declared malarial deaths.

The officials said at least 200 people in the district, whose blood samples showed plasmodium falciparum in rapid diagnostic kit tests, died but their names could not be included in the official list in the absence of blood slide confirmation. The death toll in the State could be about 500, the officials said.

Patients in corridors, on floors

In the 200-bed North Lakhimpur Civil Hospital, there were more than 400 malaria patients from all over the district. In all corridors, converted into a hospital extension, patients were lying on beds supplied by the district administration.

Lying on the floors were some with intravenous fluid administered by paramedics.

As the influx kept increasing, the district administration on Wednesday asked the hospital superintendent to shift his office so that more patients could be accommodated there.

Ganesh Saikia, sub-divisional medical and health officer, attributed the epidemic to "lack of active surveillance" and the failure of the malaria control structure to carry out timely measures as required under the National Vector Borne Disease Control Programme.

A UNICEF team from Delhi, after a survey of the affected areas, suggested to the Health Department that the malaria surveillance and service structure be immediately activated, said Mr. Saikia.

He said preventive measures such as spraying of DDT, impregnation of mosquito nets and regular collection of blood slides in malaria-prone areas were not taken.

No lab technician

Under the National Vector Borne Disease Control Programme, surveillance workers are required to go house-to-house every 15 days for spraying DDT and for collecting blood samples, which should be deposited in the laboratory attached to the health centre concerned. For the past two months, no blood slide collected from villages could be tested in the Laluk subsidiary health centre as the laboratory technician was transferred and no replacement provided.

Most of the patients and attendants in the North Lakhimpur Civil Hospital said they had not seen any surveillance worker or DDT spraying squad in their villages for several years.

"They came to spray DDT only after the disease had claimed several lives and affected virtually every house in our village," said Ghankanta Gohain Barua of Sakatpur near the Lilabari airport, about 15 km from here.

Medical teams coming

To cope up with the situation, the district administration has requisitioned the services of medical teams from Shillong, Guwahati and Dibrugarh.

A 12-member team equipped with microscopes has arrived in the district to help health officials with a quick analysis of blood samples collected from various places.

Mr Saikia said that with more medical teams visiting the remote areas and organising camps in the affected places, the detection of cases also went up.

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