Praise is the overflow of a joyful heart.

Last Saturday, I received word that the Department of Health released a report about the current state of dengue in the country. In the report, the DOH announced that the number of dengue-related deaths in 2024 so far has reached 881 and 340,860 recorded cases of dengue since the beginning of 2024 or 81 percent higher compared to 2023 where there were only 188,574 cases.

The Department of Health has recorded an increase of over 80 percent in dengue cases in the country.

I personally heard of two dengue deaths in a span of just a week. One is a five-year old girl and another, a college student.

In a small makeshift home in a poverty-stricken neighborhood somewhere in Metro Manila, a five-year-old girl’s family is in mourning. Their beloved girl died of dengue a few days ago. They couldn’t afford to pay for medical treatment so they didn’t bring the girl to the hospital for confinement until it was too late.