An Investigation into Outbreak of Malaria in Bareilly District of Uttar Pradesh, India

Abstract

Uttar Pradesh is the largest state of India and is comprised of 75 revenue districts. It has vast area of 243,286 km² and 230 million population (199.81 million as per 2011 census) with population density of 828 persons per km². The topographical & environmental conditions including availability of rich irrigation facilities provide congenial conditions for development of different vectors transmitting various diseases. All the six Vector Borne Diseases (VBD) namely malaria, dengue, Chikungunya, Japanese Encephalitis (JE), Kala-azar & Lymphatic filariasis are prevalent in Uttar Pradesh and are now modifiable in the state since 2016. Among these, malaria, JE, dengue etc. are epidemic prone and claim lives during outbreak, if remained unattended in light of the NVBDCP operational guidelines. During July/ August, 2018, district Bareilly experienced outbreak of malaria, which claimed several lives according to various reports appeared in the media. A team of Officers from Regional Office for Health & Family Welfare (ROH & FW), Lucknow visited Bareilly district of UP during September, 2018 to assess the various factors responsible for the present outbreak and to guide & support the district health authorities for proper implementation of the various intervention measures to contain the outbreak. The detailed investigations revealed that the reasons for outbreak may be assigned to the excessive rainfall in the district, poor surveillance due to inadequate number of peripheral health workers, lack of laboratory facilities and improper monitoring & lack of timely actions. The screening of people for malaria with bivalent antigen based RDT kits reflected high malaria positivity both Plasmodium vivax (P.v.) & Plasmodium falciparum (P.f.) incidence but no fever related death was confirmed due to malaria.