Help keep Chikungunya away

CHIKUNGUNYA FEVER has not yet reached Barbados and officials want to keep it that way.
Environmental officer at the Randal Phillips Polyclinic, Sean Blackman, is therefore encouraging people to check in and around their homes, including the seals to the water storage tanks.
He urged members of the public to check for areas where water can collect and create conditions for mosquito breeding, and to take steps to eliminate them.
“I’m asking the public at large to really take heed to the advisories made by the Environmental Health Department in relation to rats, whether it be mosquitoes, whether it be food safety. . . .To take heed to those little tips we put out there for you. In your interest, in your family’s interest; we ask that you comply.”
Blackman was speaking at a community outreach programme by the four polyclinics in the south of the island yesterday.
Chikungunya is a mosquito-borne viral disease causing symptoms such as fever, joint pain, muscle pain, headache and nose and gum bleeding. It is spread by the Aedes aegypti mosquito, which also carries the dengue virus.
The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control said thousands of cases have been recorded in the Caribbean.  (YB)