PUNE: The Union health ministry has rushed a multi-disciplinary team to Maharashtra to monitor the Zika virus situation and support the state government in bolstering the surveillance after a 50-year-old Belsar village woman from rural Pune was detected with Zika-Chikungunya coinfection on July 30.
“The central team will work closely with the state health department, take stock of the ground situation and assess if the national action plan for control of Zika virus is being implemented. It will suggest measures for bolstering surveillance and vector control,” said Aayush Prasad, chief executive officer, Pune Zilla Parishad.
The state health officials have stepped up fever surveillance and mosquito-control measures in Belsar and surrounding villages in Purandar taluka following the detection of the first case of Zika virus in Maharashtra. The health teams drew blood samples of another 46 residents of Belsar village on Monday. “They include two fever patients, eight pregnant women, 13 close contacts and 26 migrant workers staying in the village,” a health official said.
The three-member central team is comprised of a public health expert from the office of the Union health ministry’s regional directorate in Pune, a gynaecologist from Lady Hardinge Medical College, New Delhi, and an entomologist from the National Institute of Malaria Research (NIMR), New Delhi, said Prasad.
The central team would recommend necessary public health interventions in the state. “Our teams will be working with the central team to ensure full containment of the virus in the region,” Prasad said.
