Cuba's Ministry of Public Health (Minsap) stated this Friday that it has not yet brought the epidemic of arboviral diseases under control on the island, highlighting cases of chikungunya and dengue. "We cannot say yet that it is under control because it is not," indicated Deputy Minister of Public Health Carilda Peña in statements to state television while explaining the fight against the mosquito, the main vector of transmission for both diseases. She commented that the cumulative number of people with 'unspecified febrile syndrome', the first common alert symptom for both arboviral diseases, is 43,911, of which 37,197 were subsequently diagnosed with chikungunya. She also detailed that the majority of new cases detected the previous day correspond to chikungunya, with 826. The doctor added that currently 25 of the 107 patients in intensive care due to complications associated with these diseases are minors. Minsap is defining the cases mainly by their symptoms, without carrying out massive tests to clinically confirm the presence of the disease, as the health authorities themselves have explained. The epidemic, a term used for the first time by the Government on November 12 to characterize the current outbreak of these two diseases, has found fertile ground in Cuba to spread months after the first cases were detected last July in Matanzas (west). Cuba's current economic crisis limits the capacity for prevention—mainly through massive mosquito fumigation—, control—with tests to confirm the type of disease—and care for the sick. Minsap has reiterated that the official figures are an underregistration because a good number of sick people do not go to hospitals for treatment.
