Malaria Death Toll Reaches 107 in Indonesia's Central Java: Report

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Wednesday, January 09, 2002

Malaria Death Toll Reaches 107 in Indonesia's Central Java: Report

A total of 107 had died from malaria between August 2001 and January this year in Banyumas, Indonesia's Central Java province, the Jakarta Post Wednesday quoted Banyumas Legislative Council's commission E chairman Musadad Bikri Noor as saying.

"These figures are based on the reports made by village and district heads that we collected during our recent impromptu visits to four districts. The reports say that as many as 107 people died from malaria between August of last year and this January," Noor said after the commission's meeting.

He added that no laboratory tests had been conducted to prove that all 107 victims had died from malaria.But he said they had suffered from symptoms very similar to those of malaria.

Noor further said that around 10,000 people were still being treated for the disease, a sometimes lethal tropical disease transmitted by the "bite" of anopheline mosquitoes.

Previously, the councillors said that malaria had killed 54, and on Saturday the commission revealed that the death toll had reached 60.

But the Banyumas Health Office head Choerul Mufied was sticking to his claim that only one person had died from malaria, but he admitted that thousands had been treated for the disease.

Noor said that the Health Office had tended to cover up the case.

The Ministry of Health had earlier said that all provinces in the country, except Jakarta, had areas vulnerable to malaria, with Papua province heading the list.

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