New health plan devised to tackle encephalitis issue by UP government

LUCKNOW: Facing backlash in control and

treatment of Acute Encephalitis

(AES) that manifests itself in the form of brain fever, the health department has now drawn a new plan for 2018 to deal with a prominent cause of AES, known as

scrub typhus

.

Within the plan, from January to March, all medical officers of the 38 districts affected by AES and JE, will be trained on prevention and treatment, especially that of scrub typhus. "Two antibiotics-Doxycycline for adults and Azithromycin for children have been identified as treatment drugs. If these be give in the first three days of fever, the patient can be helped. Our staff needs training on these aspects," said director, communicable and vector borne diseases unit, Dr Mithilesh Chaturvedi.

"The season for AES to spread widely is between June and October, so the training will be done in January," she added. The education department has also been roped in for a combined effort.

According to a joint research by Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Atlanta, National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences (NIMHANS), Bangalore and the state health department 30-40% cases were found to be affected with scrub typhus. Under this 2,232 AES samples from 2014 to 2016 were tested

King George's Medical University

’s (KGMU) lab.

While the prevention of scrub typhus is still under research, mites, ticks, rats have been found as the carrier and cause behind scrub typhus. Experts at the vector borne diseases unit also claimed that the causative factor of almost 50% of the AES cases still remains unknown. After scrub typhus, JE cases stood at less than 10% and dengue cases notified under AES made up for around 4-8%, in the research.

The plan developed by the health department claims training of pathologists in 19 government laboratories in the state. "Two meeting have already been done in this regard and the education department has been asked to give details of all its nodal officers. This will ensure touching school children upto the age of 15 years, who are the ones affected with AES and JE," said Dr Chaturvedi.