The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) on Wednesday said it has destroyed 43,607 mosquito breeding spots from across the city in a span of eight months. Of the total breeding spots destroyed, 35,151 spots contained larvae of "Aedes aegypti'' mosquito that causes dengue and 8,456 larvae of ''Anopheles stephensi'' mosquito that causes malaria.
"Of the total 74.09 lakh premises checked between January 1 to August 24, we found 43,607 breeding spots across the city. Apart from this, 3,23,579 small and big items and 11,153 tyres which holds fresh water and becomes mosquito breeding spots during this period of eight months have been removed by the department," said Rajan Naringrekar, head of pesticide department .
The civic body has intensified its combing operation (process of checking unprotected and unattended spots which holds fresh water) in nine wards in city region citing it has more number of Dengue and Malaria cases as compared to eastern and western suburbs.
A special campaign was launched from August 6, 2020 in these nine wards. A total of 6,508 buildings were inspected by the Pesticides Department during this operation. Of the 20,772 possible breeding spots examined in G (south) ward (Worli, Prabhadevi) 829 Anopheles mosquitoes have been identified and destroyed. A total of 4,326 spots were investigated in the 'E' ward (Byculla, Nagpada) and 163 breeding spots of Anopheles mosquitoes were destroyed.
Last year until July 18, the civic body claimed to have removed and cleaned total 8,729 unattended tyres from various localities and destroyed 2.84 lakh mosquito breeding spots to check the spread of Dengue, Malaria and other vector-borne infections since January 1 this year.
"The combing operations and clean up took a back seat between March and April this year after the pandemic hit the city. However, starting May last week we intensified our combing operations," said an official from BMC insecticide department.
"Inspection of unprotected and unattended water pots, bottles, thermocol, tanks, wells, fountains, tyres, refrigerators etc. is carried out to ensure that these spots do not turn out to be hotbeds for mosquito breeding," the official said.
