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Failure to Contain Dengue

Govt, city corporations can't avoid liability: HC

Staff Correspondent
The High Court yesterday observed that the government and both Dhaka city corporations cannot avoid liability in failure to purchase effective insecticides on time to kill Aedes mosquitoes.
“Adults and children are suffering and dying due to dengue fever. Such a situation has been created due to negligence of the authorities concerned. The city corporations [of Dhaka] as well as the government cannot avoid the responsibility of not bringing the pesticide on time," it said.
The HC bench of Justice Tariq ul Hakim and Justice Md Shohrowardi made the observation while hearing a suo moto (voluntary) rule it issued earlier in this regard.
The court made the observation as Dhaka South City Corporation (DSCC) lawyer Sayeed Ahmed Raja told the court that the government needed to take responsibility of importing insecticide from abroad during such a crisis.
Instead of doing it, the government has left the responsibility to the city corporations and therefore, it is being delayed, he said.
"It seems to me that the administration has a negligence in this regard," Advocate Raja said, adding a judicial enquiry needs to be conducted to find out whether the authorities have failed or were negligent
and the court can pass a necessary order.
The court then set tomorrow [Wednesday] f°r passing an order, on whether a judicial commission will be constituted to enquire whether there is any negligence of the authorities in purchasing effective insecticide, and into incident of deaths due to dengue and chikungunya, another mosquito-borne disease.
Earlier in the day, the LGRD ministry submitted a report to the HC saying that the government is working to formulate a long-term plan to prevent dengue and chikungunya in future.
DSCC and Dhaka North City Corporation (DNCC) also placed separate reports before the HC, describing in details their activities in killing Aedes mosquito.
Deputy Attorney General Kazi Mynul Hasan represented the government, while Barrister Toufiq Inam appeared for DNCC.
A record 63,514 dengue infected people went to hospitals this year, according to the Directorate General of Health Services, five times that of last year. The total number of infected people are likely to be even higher, as many cases go unreported.
At least 5,940 people are currently admitted to different hospitals across the country.
In 24 hours since 8am on Saturday, at least 1,299 new patients - 607 in Dhaka and the rest outside the capital - had been admitted to different hospitals, according to DGHS.