THE URGENCY of the situation which prompted the Jamaica Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (JSPCA) to issue a warning last week about the possible further spread of leptospirosis seems to have escaped public health authorities.
Quite apart from the continued presence of mounds of garbage in sections of the Corporate Area and other urban centres in the island, the Government's public information arm has been slow to educate the public of the related dangers of poor disposal of food wastes. Poor garbage disposal habits continue to feed the population growth of dangerous vermin.
According to the JSPCA there has been a nearly 100 per cent increase in cases of leptospirosis among dogs in the Kingston and St. Andrew Metropolitan Area, and last week warned about a possible outbreak of the disease among humans. From only one or two cases of leptospirosis per year in dogs, the JSPCA is now seeing four to five cases on a weekly basis.
Leptospirosis is a bacterial disease that affects a range of animals, including dogs and horses, as well as humans. The bacterial infection, in humans, causes a wide range of symptoms, but some infected persons may show no symptoms at all. Symptoms include high fever, severe headache, chills, muscle aches and vomiting, and may include jaundice showing up as yellow skin and yellow eyes, abdominal pain, diarrhoea and skin rashes.
If the disease is not treated, the patient can develop kidney damage, meningitis, liver failure and respiratory distress. Rat bites or eating or drinking rat-contaminated food transmit the bacteria from the rodents to humans. Thankfully, only in a few cases of the disease does death occur.
But the infestation of rats exposes the human population to significant risks of infectious diseases, leptospirosis being just one of them. We expect the public health authorities to treat the matter with the seriousness and the urgency which the threat of an outbreak of infectious disease requires.
The rats must be dealt with. But equally important, their breeding grounds must be cleaned up. The laws regulating proper disposal of organic wastes must be rigorously enforced. Establishments in breach must shape up or be shut down.
Throughout history rats have lived close to human beings, feeding on our refuse, rapidly multiplying - and transmitting diseases to us. Total elimination may not be a possibility, but we have the know-how to curtail rat populations and to reduce the risk these vermin pose. The warnings of the veterinarians at this early stage of a potential disease outbreak must be heeded and decisive corrective action taken now.
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