The Ministry of Health is to intensify its mosquito control programme in all parishes, in the wake of an increase in the number of reported cases of dengue fever in the island.

Director of the Health Promotion and Protection Unit in the Ministry of Health, Dr. Kevin Harvey, said the ministry is looking at some of the steps required to lessen the mosquito population within the short term.

He said so far, there have been 507 reports of the disease, of which 180 cases have been confirmed by laboratory test.

Dr Harvey said the ministry has been receiving reports from all parishes, but it is more prevalent in the town centres.

He noted that the situation could reach the level of an outbreak.

There were more than 1,700 confirmed cases of the illness in 2007.

Dengue is endemic to Jamaica and from time-to-time there is a seasonal increase in the number of reported cases in the country.

It is caused by a virus transmitted from the Aedes Aegypti mosquito, which can breed easily in and around the home.

Persons are therefore being urged to reduce breeding sites around their premises.

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