Prevention If You Can Cure!

17^th August 2011

Situation: The Prime Minister has contracted the dengue fever. Officials tell us it is not a serious strain but the public gives a strange response. If it's not SO serious then why make a big deal about it? Is it just then a ploy by the government to soften the public's view against them? If our 'beloved' PM has it, anybody can be a victim and therefore maybe it isn't right to blame the Health Authority on their handling of the situation? Or maybe it's just time for them to literally 'clean up their act'.

1800 cases of dengue so far for the year? Less than last year they say. It does’t feel that way to us and especially since the statistics are not up to date it probably is more than 1800. That brings to mind something though. All this bush around the place which is obviously harvesting hordes of mosquitoes, last year around this time it was not so bushy.
And if you catch what I’m getting at you probably are a CEPEP maintenance worker who had a job last year and have none this year since the current ‘administration’ felt that you were expendable and cut the program.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I Agree that the CEPEP program should have been cut. It was never meant to be a permanent source of employment. It was a training program providing work for citizens while training them in a chosen vocation. People just get hook on it and wanted to make it their ‘permanent’ job which is why you voted in the current government who stupidly promised you that they would keep the program running even though they knew they wouldn't.


However, my point is, why isn’t there a general countrywide clean-up program anyway? And I’m not talking about the annual thing TIDCO (Tourism and Industrial Development Company) does do on the beach. I’m talking about an everyday all year all the time cleaning service for the country like what the city corporation does for Port-of-Spain. The current CEPEP program was not supposed to be permanent but that doesn’t mean that we can’t put something like that in place.

It's a great idea. Why? Because you can clean your yard all you want, empty stagnant water, clean out all the brick holes, and spray till you nearly dead with cough but if it have a lot of land next door that does never get clean it will always have mosquitoes! You think that they wouldn’t find you in the night when you sound asleep and underneath your net too?
Health officials cannot always blame peoples living conditions for them contracting dengue. There are a lot of empty lots all over the country that are unattended, from savannahs to football fields to vacated, old houses on properties. Who are responsible for cleaning these places that inevitably contribute to the spreading of dengue as well?


So, Mr. Fuad Khan are you going to tell Madame Prime Minister that she needs to be more vigilant about keeping her surrounding clean to prevent mosquitoes breeding like you did the poor parents whose children contracted the disease and some of them who even died? Or is the government going to do the right thing and accept some responsibility for the epidemic and be aggressive with their clean-up campaign.


I remember long time, every so often meaning twice or three times a year, the 'mosquito people' (that's what I called them) used to come around and spray the area in the villages, put the powder thing in your water tank outside to kill any mosquitoes who found their way in there and so forth. Nobody asked them to come, but they came, just like Courts to repossess your furniture, they showed up one day and did their thing.
Obviously it was some programme in the government at the time to maybe prevent water borne diseases and mosquitoes, something! Why don't they do that any more? I don't remember the last time I saw someone come around from the health authority or whichever branch of the government to do those things. Maybe the practices are no longer condoned by international health standards but something else needs to be put into place!


The government needs to get out there. Work with the councillors in the towns and villages, especially the areas that have the highest cases of dengue to find vacant lots that need to be cleaned and get a campaign together and start working on eradicating the dengue virus through prevention more than treatment cause we doctors need help, I sorry! Don't wait on citizens to call. We want to build a thousand and one building to reach a first world status but we can't beat dengue?


Take the matter into your own hands as the government and move pro-actively. That will save face in the eyes of the nation A LOT BETTER than crying how the PM sick. Sick? Go clean your yard Prime Minister, is your fault you got dengue. That's the advice we got from the Health Authority and we are giving it to you.


So, my question today, apart from all that is, do you think that the ending of the CEPEP program has now caused us more trouble as we are ultimately reaping the rewards of higher dengue cases due to lack of a clean environment?

Leh meh hear yuh nah?!

Trinbagonian Baby

Dealing with real, everyday issues in Trinidad and Tobago today.

Ready or Not, Here Dengue Comes!

10^th Aug. 2011

Situation: Dengue Haemorrhagic fever is rampant again and the latest victim is an eight year old girl. The child's parents believe the hospital did not do everything they could to treat her as they sent her home 3 o' clock in the morning despite her condition and she died hours after when she became unconscious and they raced her back to the hospital.

Dengue. Yes, like flooding, corruption in the government and high food prices, we have to deal with it every year and it's always the same stupidness. Like we can’t figure it out yet. On Wednesday (10^th), in the Newsday newspaper I believe, was a picture of little Asia Archibald (correct me if the name is spelt wrong) laid to rest after dying from dengue and then the same night we had to watch the Health Minister, Dr. Fuad Khan, say on the news that all procedures were followed and the doctors were right in sending her home.

Now, is it just me or do the doctors in Trinidad and Tobago public health system seem to be not properly trained? I’m sure all procedures were followed Mr. Khan but was it the right thing to do? Aren’t doctors supposed to take care of people? Aren’t they supposed to look after the patients interest first? A doctor, especially our doctors who have to deal with dengue cases EVERY single year, are supposed to know a person’s state in all phases of the illness. What their blood pressure should be like, their heart rate, their response time, their reflexes, all the things about them that will give you an automatic red flag to know that they are in a serious state so you can make a critical decision to save someone’s life despite procedure. Clearly Asia was in the deep end and possibly in the last phase of the illness as she died only hours after.

You telling me no doctor there at the time could have seen that? Any doctor, despite procedure, who could have recognized the condition that that child was in would have known that she needed immediate treatment and needed to be constantly monitored and would have never sent her home. It don’t take test results for a GOOD, TRAINED doctor to recognize the symptoms of a possibly fatal yes, but still seemingly common illness, in Trinidad and Tobago any way, and treat it accordingly. Which leaves us to think that our doctors could not possibly be properly trained!

I’m sorry, Mr. Khan, but come better than that. They could have at least kept that child and monitored her as she obviously showed symptoms of dengue, or else why would they send to test for it, despite the fact that the official results didn’t come back yet.

So my question today, do you think our doctors are really trained and capable of handling the dengue illness as Mr. Khan assured us? And are the hospital procedures to be placed above taking every action possible to save a life?

Leh meh hear yuh nah?!

Trinbagonian Baby

Dealing with real, everyday issues in Trinidad and Tobago today.

Also see link below for story in the Trinidad Newsday.