Days
after Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) issued a notice to NGO
Praja Foundation for alleged misinterpretation of facts in its latest
health report, which claimed that dengue cases have seen a massive rise
of 265% in Mumbai in the last five years, the civic body on Wednesday
released information on the action it had taken to check the spread of
dengue.

The BMC said that the Public Health Department had
conducted inspections to check breeding places for the disease spreading
mosquitoes from January 1 to July 15, this year. As per the report, the
BMC made 62,43,597 house visits during these past six months and issued
8,744 notices to owners of premises with unprotected water tanks,
wells, fountains and so on. It collected Rs. 20,04,600 in fines from
notices issued for not adhering to safety standards.

“There were
7,586 places where the larva of Aedes Agypti, also known as the yellow
fever mosquito, one that can spread dengue fever, chikungunya, Zika
fever, Mayaro and yellow fever viruses. In 2,674 places, the BMC team
found larvae of the malaria causing Anopheles mosquitoes. These breeding
sites have now been eliminated,” Dr. Rajan Naringrekar, pesticide
officer of the BMC, said.

The BMC also appealed to the citizens of
Mumbai to destroy all useless scrap material like tyres, thermocol,
coconut remains and plastic as water is stored in them and they become
breeding grounds for infectious mosquitoes.

It takes eight days
for the larva to turn into mosquitoes, hence the BMC has said that water
should not be stored for more than seven days in utensils or other
storage places and people should ensure that water tanks are cleaned
every week.

On July 13, deputy municipal commissioner (public
health), Sunil Dhamne and executive health officer, BMC, Dr. Padmaja
Keskar had issued a notice to NGO Praja Foundation for its report ‘State
of Health of Mumbai,’ saying that the same ‘misinterpreted’ facts and
was ‘misleading’ and was an attempt to malign the image of the civic
body. The NGO, a watchdog of civic affairs, had in its report released
on July 12, claimed that dengue cases have spiralled from 4,867 in
2012-13 to 17,771 in 2016-17.

In the notice issued on Friday, the
BMC said, “It appears from the report that the whole aim of the exercise
has been to malign the public body and mislead the citizens at large.”
The BMC threatened action against the NGO if a public clarification is
not issued by them. “It seems that you have done random collection of
data from health facilities and added it, making it vague,” it stated.