Rising trend of dengue in urban areas: A challenge

CONTEXT: Dengue, a mosquito-borne illness, is endemic over 100 countries around the world. Dengue cases have been on rise in India in the past decade. The present study was conducted to describe dengue cases of a ward in an urban area. AIMS: To analyse the 5-year trend of cases of dengue fever, the 5-year trend of disease burden attributable to dengue as a proportion of all consultations, and the 5-year trend of mortality attributable to dengue as a proportion of all deaths in an urban area. SETTINGS: The present study is a retrospective record-based study, carried out from January 2014 to December 2019. MATERIAL AND METHODS: Descriptive analysis was used to describe the cases. Standard statistical tools such as Chi square for linear trends were utilised for data analysis. RESULTS: Except for a marginal dip in the year 2017, we observed that the trend of dengue significantly increased during the period of our study (Chi square for linear trend = 217.54; P = 0). We also observed a generally significantly increasing trend in burden of dengue as a disease, measured as a proportion of all consultations (Chi square for linear trend = 14302.72; P = 0). Mortality attributable to dengue measured as a ratio of deaths because of dengue and deaths because of all causes also shows a generally increasing trend with a slight decrease in 2018 (Chi square for linear trend = 371.24; P = 0). CONCLUSION: Dengue cases and the percentage of consultations attributable to dengue show an increasing trend over the past 5 years.