The Centro para el Control de Enfermedades Tropicales (CENCET), the organization in charge of tropical diseases in the DR, issued a report on 4 February whereby it states that it is no longer recommending malaria prophylaxis for tourists visiting the East Coast. The report was mailed out to health organizations around the world. In the past four weeks no case of malaria has been registered in the La Altagracia province, where a malaria outbreak took place last year. Intensive efforts to control malaria in the area thus have been successful. The Dominican government health authorities now only recommend prophylaxis for those visitors that will be traveling to rural areas. It continues to recommend that visitors use insect repellents at night when going beyond resort confines, especially when visiting rural areas at night. The CENCET says that preventive measures implemented at the time of the outbreak to interrupt transmission of the disease, including intensified surveillance and vector control, will be continued to avoid a repeat of the unfortunate situation. The outbreak occurred due to an increase in Haitian construction workers building new hotels in the area. The CENCET continues to recommend that tourists that may come down with a fever during their stay or within the next 15 days after returning visit a doctor and explain they have visited a tropical country. From 31st week of the year when the outbreak started through 49th week of the year when it was controlled, there were 359 cases of malaria in the La Altagracia province, 77% occurring in construction workers, 6.5% in employees and 17% in area residents. In the entire Dominican Republic, in 1999, there were 3,590 cases detected, of which 1,845 (51.3%) were migrant Haitian workers, 1,730 (48.3%) were Dominicans, and 15 (0.4%) were persons of other nationalities. For more background information, see earlier reports at http://www.dr1.com/daily/malaria011900.shtml Also, Health Canada at (http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/hpb/lcdc/osh/maldr_e.html) Or the US government Center for Disease Control page at http://www.cdc.gov (9 February 2000)
