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|  Published Wednesday, July 1, 2020
cases registered in the country
By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
In addition to sanitary measures to prevent the spread of coronavirus covid-19 in the country, on Tuesday the Ministry of Health made a call to the public to increase sanitation measures to clean places where it can harbor the Aedes aegypti mosquito, the agent transmitter of dengue.
Dengue is a viral infection transmitted by the bite of an infected female Aedes mosquito. There are four distinct serotypes of the dengue virus: DEN 1, DEN 2, DEN 3 and DEN 4. Symptoms appear in 3–14 days, an average 4–7 days, after the infected bite. Dengue fever is a flu-like illness that affects infants, young children and adults.
There is no specific treatment for dengue fever. Severe dengue is potentially lethal, but early clinical diagnosis and careful clinical management often save lives.
According to the ministry, the mosquito multiplies even more during the rainy season, so-called green season, from May to November, causing an increase in cases of dengue infections.
Costa Rica is a tropical country due to how close it is to the Equator. The climate is divided into two periods, a dry season, known as high-sunny season, and a rainy-green season. The sunny season runs from December to May and the green season from May to November.
According to statistics provided by the ministry, from the months of January to June there have been 3,729 cases of dengue registered in the country. During that same period in 2019, there were 1,564 cases. So this year the number of infected people has increased by 40%.
The regions with the most cases are the Caribbean Coast zone in the Limón Province with 1,505 cases and the Pacific Coast Southern zone, from Perez Zeledón Canton to the border with Panama, with 656 cases.
So far, there are no recorded deaths from dengue.
"We are in a difficult moment where the country faces covid-19, but unfortunately, the other diseases continue their cycle, that is why we call on the population to help us at home, with the elimination of places where mosquitoes reproduce,” said Rodrigo Marín, a representative of the ministry.
Authorities continue to carry out control and mitigation work on the sites where the mosquito breeds, but it isn’t enough. There must be more done to bring about awareness. Authorities call on the people to remove all objects that could contain rainwater to avoid mosquito reproduction.
Specialists recommend clean open areas and avoid having dirty tires, containers, buckets and drinking containers for pets and nearby trash cans. They also recommend wearing long-sleeved shirts and long pants to avoid mosquito bites, as well as using mosquito nets on doors and windows.
There’s the obvious recommendation to always apply mosquito repellent to exposed skin.
According to the World Health Organization, more than 70% of the disease burden is in South-East Asia and the Western Pacific. In Latin America and the Caribbean, the incidents and severity of disease have increased rapidly in recent years.
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