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Islands in focus: Officials play blame game over dengue
As the death toll from dengue fever rises in the city, local officials in Gorontalo municipality have descended into finger-pointing over the failure to anticipate the spread of the mosquito-borne disease, which has killed nine local residents since the beginning of the year
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s the death toll from dengue fever rises in the city, local officials in Gorontalo municipality have descended into finger-pointing over the failure to anticipate the spread of the mosquito-borne disease, which has killed nine local residents since the beginning of the year.
On Friday, Gorontalo Deputy Mayor Budi Doku accused the city's health agency of using some of the Rp 100 million (US$7,334) allocated for fogging to pay the travel expenses of agency officials.
'In a recent meeting, I asked the agency why fogging officers hadn't received payment. It turned out that some of the money had been used to pay for official travel expenses to Jakarta,' Budi said.
However, Gorontalo Health Agency head Nur Albar defended his agency, claiming that the issue was down to a misunderstanding.
'We have explained everything to the deputy mayor. All the agency's expenses are above board,' Nur told The Jakarta Post in a text message.
The Health Ministry said on Saturday that 11 regencies and municipalities in seven provinces had declared an 'extraordinary occurrence' over the outbreak of dengue, namely Tangerang, Banten; Lubuklinggau, South Sumatra; Bengkulu; Denpasar and Gianyar, Bali; Bulukumba, Pangkep, North Luwu and Wajo, South Sulawesi; Gorontalo; and Kaimana, West Papua.
