Thursday, June 02, 2016

 

Fighting dengue in our midst

Fighting dengue in our midst

Our longstanding fight against this dengue menace has not had any success all along. Recent press reports of escalating incidents of attack do show that all our efforts and control measures have not been effective. And the recent extra measures taken over the Zika case has uncovered other areas of mosquito breeding grounds.

In the light of these, may I draw attention to two additional areas where the control of mosquito breeding may be effective. These are the proper flushing of our neighbourhood drains and the natural containment of mosquito larva from breeding.

Our HDB flat roofs are large rainfall areas; and rainfall here can be collected into storage tanks and used to flush the drains at specific times according to the breeding cycle of the mosquitos. These tanks may be replenished with portable water such as seawater or sewage effluent when necessary. These specific flushings will rid our drains of the mosquito larva before they hatch.

Build ponds in our HDB estates, with water plants and small trees, and conducive nooks and corners for tropical fishes like guppies, platyfishes, or others which are natural mosquito eaters. These small natural ecosystems will also enhance our dull HDB landscape and provide the residents a return of such things like beautiful damselflies, butterflies, dragonflies and sunbirds, etc. When these ponds exist these creatures and more will come.  Mosquitos are naturally drawn to water areas and lay their eggs in these ponds, but their eggs would be eaten by the fish therein. And our children will also be able to learn about nature at our doorsteps

# posted by chunmu @ 3:50 AM
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