Travel Bulletin Cambodia: Country Braces for Nightmare Dengue Season

Dengue season—June and July—is approaching in Cambodia where the National Dengue Control Program (NDCP) is warning of an impending outbreak at least as severe as the 2007 epidemic when 40,000 people were hospitalized, 10,000 in one week. A spokesman for the NDCP says the number of cases in recent months has been unusually high, which has been a reliable predictor of large scale outbreaks in the past. Adding to the anxiety is the detection of a new serotype as well as Dengue hemorrhagic fever, which may make cases more deadly or difficult to treat. Prevention programs have been woefully underfunded. Ironically, Cambodia is home to a demonstration project costing $1 per household that has been effective in preventing local outbreaks by introducing guppy fish into water storage containers to eat the larvae of the mosquito that transmits Dengue.