Environment
Loagan Bunut National Park Has Dried Up
Loagan Bunut National Park has been totally dry since July 4 due to the recent dry spell.
According to the Sarawak Forestry Corporation, this is the third time the lake has dried up this year, first two drying during several weeks March and then May. The Loagan Bunut National Park is currently temporarily closed to visitors.
6th July 2013 : Pujut Declared Dengue Outbreak Hotspot
In a recent statistics report, Pujut has been declared a dengue outbreak zone in Miri due to increase of Dengue cases reported.
This is not the first time Pujut had been delcared a Dengue outbreak area. In 2009 to 2010 it has also been declared an outbreak zone. This is according to deputy health officer Dr Veronica Lugah from the Divisional Health Office. It is the first dengue outbreak recorded for 2013.
Pujut had 13 cases of dengue outbreak reported in June alone. This alerted the authorities to declare the outbreak zone.
Pujut Corner is the hotspot, and there are also cases in Pujut Anting, Pujut Rail and Pujut Tanjong Batu. Besides Pujut areas, there are also cases reported in Tudan, Permyjaya and Taman Tunku.
The Health Ministry had begun conducting a nationwide public health law enforcement operation to stem the dengue outbreak, those found to have Aedes breeding grounds within their premises could face stiff fines.
See previous statistics for dengue outbreaks in Miri
Sign & Symptoms of Dengue infection:
- High continous fever of 3 days or more
- Headache, backache and retrobital pain
- Abdominal pain, vomiting, loose stools
- Petechial haemorrhage and/or spontaneous bleeding
- Rash - generalized flushing/maculopapular/confluent rash with small islands of normal skin.
- Hepatomegaly
- Fall in platelet count that precedes or occurs simultaneously with a rise in the haematocrit
- Normal WBC or leucopenia with relative lymphocytosis
- Normal ESR (
- Shock
Dengue virus infection may present in four different clinical syndromes:
- Undifferentiated fever
- Dengue fever
An acute febrile illness with sudden onset of fever with two or more of the following manifestations:
Headache, retro orbital pain, myalgia, arthralgia, skin rash, haemorrhagic manifestations and leucopenia.
AND Supportive serology (refer to lab diagnosis) OR
Occurance at the same location and time as other confirmed cases of DF.
It is known as 'breakbone fever' because of severe muscular pains. The fever maybe biphasic (i.e two separate episodes or waves of fever) Most patients recover after a few days.
- Dengue haemorrhagic
- An acute onset of fever followed by other symptoms resulting from thrombocytopenia, increased vascular permeability and haemorrhagic manifestations.
- Dengue Shock Syndrome
- Supervenes in a small proportion of cases. Severe hypotension develops, requiring urgent medical treatment to correct hypovolaemia. Without appropriate treatment, 40%-50% of cases are fatal. While with timely therapy, the mortality rate is 1% or less.
Complication
Hepatomegaly, pleural effusion, ascites, bleeding in any forms, unusual neurological presentations include mononeuropathies, polyneuropathies, encephalitis and transverse myelitis.
Encephalopathy occurs occasionally and may result from liver failure or electrolyte imbalances and sometimes shock which may lead to death.
Treatment
Specific treatment : None
Symptomatic treatment
Advise rest, drink plenty of fluids and take regular painkillers (e.g. Paracetamol or Ibuprofen) to relieve symptoms of fever or aching
- Fluid replacement (Plenty of oral or IV fluids),
- Blood transfusion ( packed red cells) in significant bleeding,
- Platelet transfusion is generally avoided unless there is significant bleeding regardless of the severity of thrombocytopenia or platelet count < 10,000/mm3 with impending or established CNS bleed or continuous bleeding from pre-existing peptic ulcer and Antipyretic for fever.
Source : MyHealth.gov.my
Miri's First Onshore Discovery of Oil in 24 Years
Oil and gas has been discovered at the Adong Kecil West-1 Well, 20km northeast of Miri town.
The well was drilled by JX Nippon Oil & Gas Exploration (Onshore Sarawak) Ltd, to a depth of 3,170 meter together with joint venture partner Petronas Carigali Sdn Bhd.
This was the first onshore discovery after 24 years. The last onshore discovery was Asam Paya Field in 1989, also in Sarawak.
In December 1910, the first oil production was at Miri's First Oil Well known as the Grand Old Lady on top of Canada Hill. The Grand Old Lady produced oil until interrupted by World War II. In that time, it had produced more than 563,484 barrels and was still producing 10 barrels per day at the time. The Grand Old Lady was still managing to produce 3 barrels of oil a day and when it was stopped, and had produced over 650,000 barrels of oil.
Say No Plastic Bag Campaign Sees Increase Use of Plastic Bags?
Apparently, in today's news the "Say No to Plastic Bag" campaign conducted by Miri City Council (MCC) in September 2009 through participating supermarkets does not seem to have helped in reducing the total quantity of plastic bags produced by the participating supermarkets.
According to the statistic issued by the City Council, the total amount of plastic bags produced by the participating outlets has actually increased from 1,072,895 pieces in year 2010 to 1,779,406 pieces last year. As of November this year, the number is at 873,847, which seems to indicate a reduction for 2012.
There were also numerous complaints from the public that there were non-participating shopping outlets that had taken advantage of the campaign by charging plastic bags at RM0.20 each for their own profit. The RM0.20 collected for each plastic bag is supposed to go into charity, although there is no detail on this.
In my point of view, they have taken the approach of charging for plastic bags, instead of REDUCING the plastic bags as they should be doing, and this is exactly what will happen as a result!
Here's a small list of suggestions to tackle this problem more effectively:
- Encourage the use of paper bags or biodegradable plastic bags. Restrict plastic bags that are not degradable. Do not charge the bags.
- Encourage local manufacturers to reduce plastic packaging. This will automatically reduce plastic waste from top to bottom. The current system works from the wrong way, bottom up, which the consumers have to bear but not the manufacturers. This is actually very unfair.
- Stop using excuses that plastic bags choking birds or sea turtles because they mistake it for jellyfish - that is another problem altogether. It has everything to do with irresponsible people disposing of their trash in the sea/rivers, and completely unrelated to plastic bags. Fix the root cause - fine the people who liter the rivers and seas!
- What is not recorded is the people buying bundles of plastic bags for their trash. People are actually buying their own plastic bags because they don't get extra plastic bags nowadays. The actual plastic bag count may actually be even higher. In short: problem not solved!
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