{"id":35174,"date":"2022-08-06T20:20:03","date_gmt":"2022-08-06T20:20:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/uganda\/all-news\/how-rains-will-affect-you"},"modified":"2022-08-06T20:30:51","modified_gmt":"2022-08-06T20:30:51","slug":"how-rains-will-affect-you","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/uganda\/all-news\/how-rains-will-affect-you","title":{"rendered":"How rains will affect you"},"content":{"rendered":"

Africa-Press – Uganda. <\/strong><\/span>The onset of a belated rainy season in Uganda looks set to be bittersweet as the joy of those that take part in rain-fed agriculture is tinged with the economic toll of water-related events.<\/p>\n

Already, the Bill for the damage inflicted by last weekend\u2019s flash floods in the eastern town of Mbale threatens to be ominous dark clouds.<\/p>\n

Besides resettling 800 households, the government has to pick up the tab for repair jobs of 14 bridges, three health centre IIIs, an industrial park and a handful of educational institutions. It also pledged to extend Shs5m to families affected by the flash floods.<\/p>\n

Now the Ministry of Health is warning that the rains, which the weatherman forecasts will pound parts of northern, eastern and mid-western Uganda this month, will most likely trigger an upsurge in malaria and cholera cases.<\/p>\n

The government spends $125m (about Shs485 billion) annually in dealing with malaria cases. A further Shs6 billion is needed to deal with cholera cases every year. It is unclear what the economic cost of an influx of malaria and cholera cases will look like. There is, however, almost complete unanimity that it won\u2019t be cheap.<\/p>\n

Saturday Monitor also understands that the Health ministry is bracing itself for the worst. Floods displace people and increase breeding grounds for mosquitoes, raising vulnerability to insect bites and the spread of malaria. A normal rainy season increases stagnant water on surfaces, which also serve as breeding grounds for mosquitoes.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith the rainy season, like we are now are getting in Bududa [and eastern Uganda], we expect those families who are displaced [because of landslides] to be subjected to a lot of mosquito bites because they are outside,\u201d Dr Henry Mwebesa, the director general of health services at the Ministry of Health, said in an interview on Thursday.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are also worried about the upsurge of cholera, especially in those areas where there have been floods and a lot of sewage has been thrown up,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Dr Imelda Tumuhairwe, the district health officer for Bududa, told Saturday Monitor that malaria is on the rise in the district.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs per the last quarter, the positivity rate is at 21 percent\u2014higher than the national target of 10 percent. We are now experiencing landslides. Two days ago, we had landslides and so we have four villages that are relocating. So we expect a tough situation in terms of malaria,\u201d she warned on Thursday.<\/p>\n

Influx of cases<\/b><\/p>\n

The warning from health officials comes amid a sustained upsurge in malaria cases in the country since November last year. Health experts have attributed the upsurge to the resistance of malaria parasites and mosquitoes to drugs and pesticides, respectively.<\/p>\n

Dr Jimmy Opigo, the head of the Malaria Control Programme at the Ministry of Health, said people are taking the medicine, but they don\u2019t get cured.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd after the medicine, you get [malaria illness] again. But in between, you are also transmitting because you are not cured. The parasite has made some changes in that our Rapid Diagnostic Test (RDT) kits detection is becoming a problem. It will indicate negative when it is not,\u201d he revealed.<\/p>\n

An average of 37,600 cases are being registered in the country per day, resulting in increased hospitalisation and deaths.<\/p>\n

Malaria kills 16 Ugandans daily and causes an estimated annual economic loss of $658m (Shs2.4trillion) due to treatment costs and work time lost, according to statistics from the Health ministry and a report by Juliet Nabyonga Orem from the World Health Organisation (WHO).<\/p>\n

Action to avert<\/b><\/p>\n

Dr Mwebesa said the Health ministry has not given up on the fight against malaria in areas that are already experiencing the upsurge.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are giving them a little more bed nets, but also treating the cases and especially the children and pregnant mothers,\u201d he revealed, adding: \u201cWe are also providing adequate blood because the children, once they get malaria, they become anaemic and that is how we lose them. We have been trying to improve blood supply to those areas.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dr Mwebesa said they are also ready to combat any incident of cholera.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are already sending our teams to the areas to prepare for any eventualities. We have already sent medicines there and we are ready to support the areas. Even for malaria, we have provided enough medicines for prevention,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Sleeping under insecticide-treated bed nets, destroying stagnant water near homes, indoor residual spray, and treatment of infected people are some of the effective ways to prevent malaria infection and deaths.<\/p>\n

Boiling drinking water or using tap water minimises the risk of cholera, according to scientists. Other preventive measures are washing hands often with soap and safe water and covering food as well as eating food when it is still hot.<\/p>\n

Drug resistance<\/b><\/p>\n

Dr Ian Clarke, the chairperson of C-Care IHK (formerly International Hospital Kampala), said drug resistance can be caused by misuse of medicines. He said medical workers wrongly give drugs such as antibiotics \u201cbecause it is more satisfying, to both the doctor and the patient, to make a diagnosis for which there is a definite treatment\u201d so as to get profit and make the patient feel their issue was handled.<\/p>\n

Dr Jimmy Opigo, the head of the Malaria Control Programme at the Ministry of Health,said they are promoting the test-and-treat strategy to avoid the wrong prescription and misuse of medicines. Lack of adherence to medication also increases the risk of mutation of the parasite, which causes drug resistance.<\/p>\n

A recent study by Bosco Agaba from Makerere University, which utilised Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR), the gold standard in medical diagnosis, to confirm the accuracy of RDTs, found that \u201c195 of 219 (89 per cent), which initially came out negative when RDT was used and positive when a microscope was used, were \u201cfalsely registered as negative on the kits\u201d. \u201cOverall, gene deletion contributed to 12.3 percent (24\/195) of false-negative RDT results. Of the false-negative RDTs results, 80.0 percent (156\/195) were from subjects with low-density infections,\u201d the report reads in part.<\/p>\n

For More News And Analysis About Uganda<\/a> Follow Africa-Press<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Africa-Press – Uganda. The onset of a belated rainy season in Uganda looks set to be bittersweet as the joy of those that take part in rain-fed agriculture is tinged with the economic toll of water-related events. Already, the Bill for the damage inflicted by last weekend\u2019s flash floods in the eastern town of Mbale […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":35173,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,3,8],"tags":[233,240,706,234],"class_list":["post-35174","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-community","category-homepage-english","tag-africa-press","tag-africa-press-uganda","tag-rainy-season-in-uganda","tag-uganda"],"yoast_head":"\nHow rains will affect you - Uganda<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The onset of a belated rainy season in Uganda looks set to be bittersweet as the joy of those that take part in rain-fed ...\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/uganda\/all-news\/how-rains-will-affect-you\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"How rains will affect you\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The onset of a belated rainy season in Uganda looks set to be bittersweet as the joy of those that take part in rain-fed ...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/uganda\/all-news\/how-rains-will-affect-you\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Uganda\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AfricaPressTunisiaa\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2022-08-06T20:20:03+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2022-08-06T20:30:51+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/uganda\/sites\/34\/2022\/08\/postQueueImg_15-62eecf634c3f5.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"800\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"5 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/uganda\/all-news\/how-rains-will-affect-you#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/uganda\/all-news\/how-rains-will-affect-you\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"cfeditoren\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/uganda\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\"},\"headline\":\"How rains will affect you\",\"datePublished\":\"2022-08-06T20:20:03+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2022-08-06T20:30:51+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/uganda\/all-news\/how-rains-will-affect-you\"},\"wordCount\":1011,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/uganda\/all-news\/how-rains-will-affect-you#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/uganda\/sites\/34\/2022\/08\/postQueueImg_15-62eecf634c3f5.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Africa Press\",\"Africa Press-Uganda\",\"rainy season in Uganda\",\"uganda\"],\"articleSection\":[\"all news\",\"community\",\"homepage-english\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/uganda\/all-news\/how-rains-will-affect-you#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/uganda\/all-news\/how-rains-will-affect-you\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/uganda\/all-news\/how-rains-will-affect-you\",\"name\":\"How rains will affect you - 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