KARACHI, Nov 4: As the fresh arrivals of suspected viral haemorrhagic fever continued unabated at various hospitals, death of a woman patient believed to be afflicted with the mosquito borne disease was reported by a private hospital on Saturday.

According to data released by the Dengue Fever Cell of the Sindh health department, the dengue toll in the city has risen to 29 while the total number of reported VHF or dengue fever cases has touched 2,551.

During the last 24 hours ending at 2 pm on Saturday, as many as 85 fresh patients were admitted to 12 government and private hospitals for treatment of VHF or DF.

A maximum of 19 patients were rushed to Liaquat National Hospital, with the history of bleeding, vomiting, rashes and abdominal pain. The number of patients tested positive for dengue fever soared to 866, taking the percentage of such patients to 37.94.

Giving detail of the death of a woman, which took place in the wee hours of October 3 and was reported to the DFC on Saturday, the focal person of the cell, Dr Abdul Majid said that a lady resident of Nazimabad, aged 24 years, was admitted to the Aga Khan University Hospital on Oct 31.

The patient, who was later diagnosed as dengue fever patient had been notified dead at Aga Khan University Hospital, taking the total VHF or dengue deaths to 32 in Sindh, including 29 deaths reported by Karachi hospitals, added Dr Majid.

He said the number of total VHF suspected cases had risen to 2583 in Sindh since June, while the tally of dengue cases as detected by health care centres increased to 877 across the province on Saturday.

According to DFC data, 315 VHF or Dengue patients are at present admitted to 19 hospitals in the province, including 91 new admissions, while 139 patients, including 134 those at Karachi, were discharged after due recovery during the last 24.

In the meantime, an AKU press release said 41 patients were currently hospitalized with suspected VHF, most of them were admitted during the last two weeks.

It was further said stated that 223 patients were diagnosed to have Dengue haemorrhagic fever, three patients suffered from Crimean-Congo Haemorrhagic Fever (CCHF), while in the remaining, the special serological tests were either negative or the results were pending. The percentage of Dengue positive cases at AKUH was 46.36.

The position of patients’ entry at some hospitals on Saturday remained as follows: Liaquat National Hospital- 31(19 new cases), Civil Hospital Karachi- nine (five new cases), Dr Ziauddin Hospital- 39 (ten new cases), JPMC-51 (12 new cases), Abbasi Shaheed-39 (three new cases), Bismillah Taqee Hospital-21 (five), Patel Hospital-8 (two), Baqai Hospital-14 (one), Karachi Adventist Hospital-9 (three), Darul Shafa-10 (six), Kutiyana Hospital- 12 (one), NICH- seven, Zain-ul Abedein-1, Chiniot Hospital-4, Zainab Punjwani Hospital-1, and Darul Sehat Hopsital-7.

A teacher in zoology at the University of Karachi said that prevention and control efforts should ideally be intensified before the transmission season rather than on response measures.