Cholera, dengue cases rose significantly in 2022

MANILA, Philippines — Dengue and cholera – two illnesses regularly monitored by the Department of Health (DOH) – have significantly infected more Filipinos in 2022 than in pandemic year 2021, records obtained by the House of Representatives revealed.

Rizal 4th District Rep. Fidel Nograles, citing comparative figures from 2021 to 2022, said that dengue cases increased by 182 percent last year and so did cholera cases by 282 percent.

Nograles, who chairs the House committee on labor and employment, said these are based the DOH’s Disease Surveillance Report that recorded 220,705 dengue cases from Jan. 1 to Dec. 17 of 2022. In 2021, there were only 78,223 cases in the same period.

For cholera, there were 5,860 cases nationwide from Jan. 1-Nov. 26, 2022, which is 282 percent more than the 1,534 cases recorded in the same period in 2021.

Nograles shed light on these figures as he led beneficiaries of the Department of Labor and Employment’s Tulong Panghanapbuhay sa Ating Disadvantaged/ Displaced (TUPAD) program in a street and creek-cleaning activity.

He emphasized the value of maintaining clean communities as he cited Region 4-A or Calabarzon (Cavite, Laguna, Batangas, Rizal and Quezon) as having a big number of dengue cases last year at 19,374.

“This is why helping each other out and cleaning everybody’s surroundings in local communities would really go a long way for the residents. Nobody is exempted from this responsibility, even those elected officials,” said the congressman.

He underscored the role that clean surroundings play in maintaining public health, adding that illnesses like dengue and cholera could be mitigated if communities, particularly waterways, were clean and unclogged.

The congressman said it is better not to rely solely on “those who are tasked to clean up these places, like our TUPAD workers. That is why we are calling on people on our next activity to let the whole community participate in this undertaking.”

He also said that having unclogged canals would ensure that the risk of flooding is not exacerbated.