MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Cases of dengue soar in Argentina

Adorni explained that no vaccination campaign was under consideration

Argentina's medical facilities have been reporting an increasing number of patients with dengue-fever-like symptoms over the past few days as authorities say that over 120,000 positive cases and 79 deaths have been confirmed in the last eight months. Nevertheless, the government of President Javier Milei will not follow up on Brazil's model and no action will be taken for the State to afford a mandatory and free-of-charge vaccination campaign.

Due to the increasing number of cases, medical facilities are no longer carrying lab tests and every patient seemingly infected with the virus is treated as a positive case, according to local media.

In Córdoba, where 9,316 cases and seven fatalities have already been confirmed so far in 2024, authorities announced that emergency rooms “do not treat on a first-come, first-served basis, but rather a first observation of the symptoms is carried out to evaluate more serious patients.”

In the province of Salta, the provincial Health Ministry canceled all non-urgent surgeries to make room for dengue patients. In Santa Fe, almost 17,000 cases had been confirmed by March 14, over 10,000 of them in violence-torn Rosario.

In this scenario, experts keep urging the population to take preventive measures to avoid the bite of the Aedes aegypti mosquito and eliminate its breeding sites.

Despite World Health Organization (WHO) recommendations, Presidential Spokesman Manuel Adorni said that a vaccination campaign was not necessary for the time being. He claimed that with the two-dose drug applied three months apart from each other immunity would be achieved when the mosquito is no longer a threat.

“It is an issue that is permanently monitored by the Ministry of Health. When there is a need to change something in the regulations or the obligatory nature of the vaccine or that it can be included in the vaccination calendar, it will be done, for now, that decision is not on the agenda,” Adorni argued. He also claimed that the vaccine's “effectiveness has not been proven,” which is only half true because the Japanese-developed Qdenga treatment has been found to work on two of the four strains of dengue.

“Of course there is advertising in case there is any emergency or any issue that needs to be communicated, for now, the case of dengue is not within that possibility,” Adorni added.

The latest epidemiological bulletin released on Sunday pointed out that ”During 2024, from week 1 to week 10, 102,898 cases of dengue were reported (representing 86% of the 120,007 cases registered in the 2023/2024 season),“ which represented ”an 11.3-fold increase this year.“

The document also mentioned ”an accumulated incidence of 255 cases per 100,000 inhabitants” with 248 cases classified as severe dengue (0.20%) and 79 fatalities.

“Regarding the temporal behavior, the persistence of cases throughout the analyzed period of the 2023/2024 season -including the winter season- and the sustained increase in the number of cases since week 40 of 2023 -beginning of October- stand out, which represents an advance of the seasonal increase from previous seasons at the national level,” it went on.

“During the present season, 3 serotypes have been identified so far circulating in the country: DEN-1, DEN-2, and DEN-3, with DEN-2 predominating followed by DEN-1. During the last epidemiological weeks, 99 cases of co-infection of serotypes DEN-1 and DEN-2 were detected, mainly in the NEA and Central regions. They were not associated with deaths,” the study also showed.

As for the age groups affected by this viral disease, they added: ”Although dengue cases were recorded in all age groups, between 15 and 64 years of age the cumulative incidence is higher than in the general population (255) and decreases towards the end of life. The minimum cumulative incidence is observed in children under 4 years of age, with 62 cases per 100,000 inhabitants, and a maximum of 335 cases per 100,000 inhabitants between 25 and 34 years of age.“

President Milei has blamed ”the negligence of Kirchnerism“ for ”not having carried out a good campaign a year ago.“

Infectiologist Eduardo López at Buenos Aires' Children's Hospital insisted that ”studies show that the vaccines are safe and effective“ while virologist Andrea Gamarnik said that Argentina was going through its ”worst dengue epidemic in history“ while the government was dismantling the country's scientific system.

”Each epidemic outbreak has been superior to the previous one during the last few years. In 2024 we will probably surpass the cases of the previous season,“ infectiologist Susana Lloveras told Infobae.

”Considering that 90% of those affected are asymptomatic, we should be close to 100,000 cases in Rosario and 200,000 in the province,” Rosario National University (UNR) expert Antonio Montero underlined. “The core of the problem is irrational urbanization,” he also said.