MAASIN CITY- The Department of Health (DOH) has called on officials and teachers of public schools to have a regular cleaning of the school surroundings in an effort to ward off presence of dengue-carrying mosquitoes.
Letty Tan and Dr. Verna Fernandez, DOH representatives for the city and province, respectively, made the call in front of school heads and district supervisors during the Oplan Balik Eskwela (OBE) convergence meeting at the city and province in two separate occasions recently.
Dengue awareness has always been part of the opening of schools, Tan said at the city Department of Education (DepEd) schools division meeting with other government agencies, May 27.
“Every 3 o’clock in the afternoon, teachers and students do the cleaning inside and outside their classrooms,” Tan stressed.
At the DepEd provincial division office, a similar message was aired by Dr. Fernandez in the inter-agency meeting on May 31.
“Stagnant water in flower vases and used tires, and other water-collecting containers must be emptied so mosquitoes can have no breeding spaces,” Fernandez said, adding that dengue has always been associated with the onset of the rainy season.
This week with the opening of classes, the city and province experienced heavy rains yesterday afternoon, Thursday June 6, while in previous nights it was also raining.
Aside from spreading awareness on dengue, Tan also discussed some health highlights for the month of June, such as taking care of one’s kidney by drinking eight glasses of water everyday to prevent kidney stones, the deployment of nurses, and blood donors’ day.
Fernandez, for her part, talked also about DOH’s continuing efforts at measles vaccination where she reported that the oldest affected so far was 80 years old, the high rate of teenage pregnancy in the province, and the regulation on the use of cellular phones among schoolchildren during class hours. (LDL/MMP/PIA-8, Southern Leyte)
