Dengue is a viral disease caused by Flavivirus spread by the Aedes mosquitos. It infects 50 to 100 million people each year with over 15,000 deaths. In the Philippines, dengue is the deadliest mosquito-borne disease. In 2010, dengue cases in reached to 135,000 with around 800 deaths, mostly children and young adults. In some areas of the Philippines, dengue has become an epidemic, and relying solely on government actions is not enough. We, members of the Mosquito-Dengue Fighters Association, a nonprofit, non-government organization, are working to fight dengue in the Philippines through mosquito eradication.
These are our ongoing activities:
* Educational presentations for school children, college students and communities to raise awareness and prevention;
* Distribution of flyers and posters on how the public can help eradicate mosquitoes;
* House-to-house campaign that educate the residents in checking and cleaning the surroundings to eradicate mosquito-breeding grounds;
* Organizing barangay heads and home owner associations for clean-up of sewage canals and their surroundings;
* Water treatment with Bti in sewage canals and ponds. Bti (Bacillus thuringiensis israelensis) is a naturally-occurring soil bacterium that attacks mosquito larvae, but will not harm other organisms and the environment;
* Campaigning for the formation of a mosquito control commission in the Philippines.
Planned additional activities:
* Stocking of fish species that will feed on mosquito larvae in ponds and sewage canals to reduce the mosquito populations;
* Stocking of the copepod Mesocyclops in stagnant ponds and water reservoirs. Mesocyclops are very tiny copepods that occur naturally in some ponds and can eat tiny mosquito larvae and reduce the mosquito populations, yet will not harm other organisms.