The Ministry declared the week from March 29 to April 4th as a National Mosquito Control Week to launch island wide cleaning campaigns for mosquito eradication.

According to the Health Services Director General Dr. Palitha Mahipala, 348,508 places were inspected in the first 3 days of the National Mosquito Control Week and mosquito larvae were present at 5,378 locations.

Notices have been issued to 14,401 locations for failing to keep the places clean and court cases were filed on 1,050 places.

Around 3,000 teams comprising health officials, public health inspectors, volunteers, officers of three armed forces and police, Civil Defense Department, the Ministry of Provincial Councils and Local Government and officials specializing in mosquito larvae science engage in joint operations during the week to inspect homes, public and religious places under the direct supervision of the Director General of Health Services.

The program was launched to prepare the general public to destroy dengue mosquito breeding places prior to the onset of the southwest monsoons in order to control any increase in the number of dengue patients in the next four months.

Awareness programs are also being carried out simultaneously on dengue and its prevention. The Health official said that the government had spent over one billion rupees on strengthening the curative services of the disease.

According to the Epidemiology Unit of the Health Ministry During the last 3 month of the year 2016, 13339 suspected dengue cases have been reported to the Epidemiology Unit from all over the island. Approximately 52.6% of dengue cases were reported from the Western province. The highest numbers of dengue cases were reported during the fourth week of 2016.

The Unit says the situation warrants regular removal of possible mosquito breeding sites from the environment.