68 pct citizens of Delhi/NCR have a family/friend affected from vector borne disease in the last month

New Delhi, India, September 16, 2016 – LocalCircles, India’s leading citizen engagement platform, in its various resident circles of Delhi/NCR, Health and AYUSH circles saw increasing number of conversations on Chikunguniya, Dengue and Malaria. As a result, it decided to conduct a citizen discussion on the subject and localized surveys to understand the magnitude of these vector borne diseases.

The participation in the poll was very high due to the sensitivity of the issue, 33,954 people weighed in with their opinion in the poll. A simple question was asked that has anyone in your family or friends suffered from Chikunguniya/Dengue/viral in the last one month ? An overwhelming 68 per cent of the people in Delhi/NCR area said yes to this question. This does not mean that 68 % people in Delhi suffered from this disease, so please note that is not the case. Extrapolating it to mean 68 % people in Delhi suffer from this disease would mean it is an epidemic, which we are not stating or claiming in this survey.

The poll results are depicting the situation on the ground that there is a disease which is rampant and 68% people in a sample of almost 34,000 people have experiences it in their family or friends. Doctors claim that besides Chikanguniya and Dengue there is strain of virus which shows all the symptoms of Chikunguniya or Dengue. The symptom is affecting appettite and joints of the patients.

The data from the survey also shows that the South of Delhi and Faridabad a suburb of Delhi in Haryana is more affected. 85 % of the 6172 people polled in the city of Faridabad claimed that they have experienced it in their family or friends. Gurgaon on the other hand had a much lower incidence of this problem with just 43% of 6519 people polled saying that they have experiences this disease among family or friends.

Clearly there is a health problem at hand and it needs to be tackled by making the health establishments in the city of Delhi, Faridabad, Noida and Gurgaon ready for it. Citizens have pointed out the lack of fogging in their areas to remove mosquitoes as it seems to be vector borne disease. Blood tests are also being overcharged by labs and small nursing homes preying on the poor suffering from this disease.

Delhi/NCR – Roll Up

Delhi

Faridabad

Gurgaon

Noida

Ghaziabad

Seasonal Disease Management – Key Issues according to Citizens

• 1. Fogging is only when an epidemic breaks out and that too only in few places
• 2. Fogging is done blindly without taking measures to identify the place of breeding or to eliminate breeding
 
• 3. There is no way for the citizens to request a second round of defogging
 
• 4. Municipality fogging trucks and automatic sewer machines have not been seen in action this year
• 5. Open drains are not cleaned and have become breeding ground for the vectors
• 6. Vacant as well as construction sites are major grounds for mosquito breeding and not much is being done by the municipality to get rid of them
• 7. Government hospitals do not handle cases of Dengue well
• 8. Patients are asked to buy the medicines themselves from outside
• 9. Availability of doctors to manage cases of Dengue and Chikungunia becomes an issue
• 10. Patients with high fever are made to wait for hours in Government hospitals before a doctor comes to see them
• 11. Blood tests for Dengue are quite expensive

For any additional query
K Yatish Rajawat | Chief Strategy Officer –LocalCircles | Mobile :09818311177

About LocalCircles

LocalCircles takes Social Media to the next level and makes it about Communities, Governance and Utility. It enables citizens to connect with communities for most aspects of urban daily life like Neighborhood, Constituency, City, Government, Causes, Interests and Needs, seek information/assistance when needed, come together for various initiatives and improve their urban daily life. LocalCircles is free for citizens and always will be!