Construction sites are everywhere you look in Kuala Lumpur, and that might just be why you also can’t stop scratching yourself outdoors: most Malaysian construction sites have been found to breed deadly dengue-carrying Aedes mosquitoes.
Between March and August, the Construction Industry Development Board (CIDB) and the Health Department inspected 304 construction sites nationwide, and found that more than three quarters of them were Aedes breeding grounds, or were at risk of being so.
Works Minister Datuk Fadullah Yusof said 236, or 77.6%, of the sites inspected were found to be conducive to mosquito breeding.
Of these sites, he said the Health Department and the Department of Occupational Safety and Health had ordered 86 to clean up.
Even the construction site at the Kuala Lumpur Hospital, which is currently undergoing facility upgrading, has been found to be at risk of becoming an Aedes breeding ground.
“The contractor was issued a seven-day stop-work order to ensure they clean up the site,” Fadillah said, according to The Malay Mail Online.
A total of 3,070 dengue cases were recorded nationwide between August 10 to 16, with Kelantan topping the table with 1,334 cases. Selangor, with 978 cases and one death, was second.
A total of 62,680 cases and 126 deaths have been recorded in the country — an increase of 264 per cent over the same period last year, where 1,275 cases and 34 deaths were recorded.
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