Dengue On The Rise

With all the recent hullaballoo about swine flu, people seem to overlook the fact that it's now Dengue season here in the Philippines, what with the onset of the rainy season.

Dengue fever has been a perennial problem here. It caused more deaths than swine flu ever did, and in a faster fashion. We already know the cause: it's a vector-borne disease, and it's main carrier is the Anopheles aegyptii day biting mosquito. What's sad is that it's actually preventable. Mosquitoes are pretty predictable, and as long as you get rid of it, there would be less outbreaks since Dengue is not spread without these carriers.

Since we live in a tropical country, I guess we do have to live with the reality that we will always be plagued by mosquitoes. However, there are ways to prevent mosquito bites and subsequent disease (like dengue or malaria). In fact, nature has provided us with some means. We currently use our own natural insect repellant (made of virgin coconut oil and oils of citronella, lemongrass and lavender) which are effective so far in preventing mosquito bites and far safer than DEET containing repellants. A good website for more information regarding mosquitoes is this: http://www.mosquitoinfo.info .