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DAP lodges official complaint with Suhakam on Health Ministry's flagrant, rampant and continuing violation of the mother of all human rights - the right to life - as a result of the mishandling of the worst dengue epidemic in the nation's history which could have caused some one hundred dengue deaths and may be another 100 lives before the end of the epidemic Suhakam Report by Lim Kit Siang (Kuala Lumpur, Monday): Together with other DAP leaders and MPs, I am lodging an official report and complaint with Suhakam on the Health Ministry's flagrant, rampant and continuing violation of the most basic of all human rights - the right to life - as a result of its mishandling of the worst dengue epidemic in the nation's history which could have caused some one hundred dengue deaths and may be another 100 lives before the end of the epidemic. The right to life is the most basic and fundamental of all human rights. In fact, I will describe it as the real mother of all human rights, without which all the other important human rights, whether liberty of the person against arbitrary arrest under the draconian detention-without-trial Internal Security Act (ISA); freedom of speech, expression, opinion and a free press against undemocratic Printing Presses and Publications Act and the Sedition Act; right to information against the Official Secrets Act; freedom of assembly and association and no torture or any inhuman treatment against the Police Act and state laws and practices; the right to the rule of law and an independent judiciary become academic and non-existent when there is no right to live. The nation's worst dengue epidemic is still raging unchecked, claiming more and more human lives every day, denying the right to live of the victims as a result of the continued mishandling of the worst dengue epidemic in the nation's history. Suhakam should immediately set up a high-level special committee, preferably headed by the Suhakam Chairman, Tan Sri Abu Talib Othman himself, comprising at least three Suhakam Commissioners to deal urgently with the first complaint it has received not only about the violation of the mother of all human rights - the right to life - but its flagrant, rampant and continuing violation more than six months after the World Health Organisation (WHO) warning last July to the region of a dengue pandemic on the scale of 1998, the worst recorded year for dengue for Malaysia and the region. The Suhakam special committee on the vilolation of "the mother of all human rights" should visit, among other places, the three areas I visited yesterday, viz: Kampung Bengali, Port Dickson - where S. Vickneswaran, 13, died of dengue in the Seremban General Hospital on Tuesday, 21.1.2003. four days after he was referred by a private clinic (which gave him a three-day treatment) for possible dengue to the Port Dickson General Hospital which treated his case as ordinary fever without admission. Kampung Sungai Kerayong, Cheras, Kuala Lumpur - a small kampong with some 20 dengue cases and three dengue deaths: the two Wazir sisters, Siti Zalikha Mohd. Wazir, 11, and Siti Zaharah, 13, who died within two days of each other on Dec. 25 and 27 last year respectively and Wong Pui San, 13, Form II student with Bukit Nanas Convent with 5As in UPSR who died at the Tung Shin hospital on January 11, 2003. India Settlement, Batu Caves, Selangor, with some 400 households and several cases of dengue deaths but where every household has experienced dengue incidence or even death of a loved one or relative or known of someone who had been stricken by dengue in recent months. My three visits yesterday to Kampung Bengali, Port Dickson; Kampung Sungai Kerayong, Kuala Lumpur and India Settlement, Batu Caves, Selangor were all very depressing experiences. In my visit to India Settlement, Batu Caves, Selangor, accompanied by T. Kannan, DAP Selangor Committee Member, Maragatam Kanniappan, DAP Wanita National Executive Council Member, S. Ramakrishnan of DAP Selangor Estate & Squatter Community Development Bureau and Rajen Diran Nallaya, DAP National Publicity Bureau Asst. Secretary, I met the families of two recent dengue deaths as well as recent dengue patients. The first case of the recent dengue death in the settlement was M. Suseelan, 29, welder, recently married whose wife, Megeswary Punitha is eight-month pregnant. Suseelan, of 1B, India Settlement, Batu Caves, died of "Dengue Shock Syndrome" at the Kuala Lumpur General Hospital on Thursday, 23rd January 2003. He had fever on 11th January before he took the KL/Spore/Cochin flight to join a group of 27 Malaysians (including his mother, K. Janaki, 54) on a Hindu pilgrimage to the Aiyappan Temple, Savaree Hills, Kerala. Suseela continued to have fever during the pilgrimage but he slogged on after treatment at the medical camp of the pilgrimage. Suseela returned to Kuala Lumpur after the pilgrimage in high fever on the morning of 17th January, and was brought to the Kuala Lumpur General Hospital after his plane landed at the KLIA and was hospitalised. On 19th January, he was sent to the ICU. He was haemorrhaging in the mouth. He died on 23rd January. In the workshop area in Taman Selayang, Batu Caves where Suseela worked, four other workers also went down with dengue. The second case of recent dengue death in the settlement was a 3 year 4 month old boy, Tishalan a/l Ammasi, who died of dengue in the Selayang General Hospital on 7th December 2002. Eldest of three sons of M. Ammasi, lorry driver and B. Eswari, machine operator who live in Klang, Tishalan is looked after by his grandmother V. Pongavanam, 68, at No. 32, India Settlement, Batu Caves, Tishalan was receiving almost daily treatment at the Selayang Polyclinic a week before and after Deepavali on November 4 for high fever. The fever subsided for two weeks but high fever returned on 26th November 2002, when he was again treated by the Selayang Polyclinic daily. On 28th the Selayang Polyclinic referred him to the Selayang General Hospital where he was warded. He went into a coma on 6th December and died on 7th December at 3.50 p.m. I am informed by the people in India Settlement that there were several dengue deaths in the area, including the nearby Kampung Letchumana, Batu Caves. They believe that there could be as many as 100 dengue cases in the India Settlement in recent months but there was never any high-impact anti-dengue campaign in the area to cleanse the area of the deadly dengue threat, especially as the area has a history of dengue deaths. Yesterday, I visited the family of Vicniswaran a/l Amgammutu, 20, in the settlement who died on "Dengue Haemorrhagic Shock" at the Selayang General Hospital on 14th April 2001, after a two-day admission, and I am told that there were dengue deaths in the settlement at the height of the previous dengue epidemics in 1997 and 1998. Up to now, the Minister of Health, Datuk Chua Jui Meng has not released any official statistics about the number of dengue cases and deaths in the worst dengue epidemic raging in the country, whether for last year or this year. The last time official statistics about the dengue situation were released by the Health Ministry was in the Senate on 18th April 2002 when the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health, S. G. Sothinathan said during question time that for the year till 30th March 2002, there were 1,696 dengue cases and seven dengue deaths reported for the whole country. From a recent Sin Chew Daily report, the Health Ministry seems to have conceded that there were 32,289 dengue cases and 57 dengue deaths country-wide last year as of 28th December 2002, with the following state-by-state breakdowns:   State No. of Dengue cases Fatalities Selangor 9,385 15 Kuala Lumpur 6723 2 Johore 4012 16 Perak 3164 10 Kelantan 1768 1 Negeri Sembilan 1574 4 Terengganu 1176 2 Sarawak 972 4 Penang 936 1 Pahang 1022 0 Kedah 718 0 Melaka 355 0 Sabah 303 2 Perlis 181 0 Total 32,289 57 The death toll of 57 countrywide fall far short of the total death tally which have been given by the various state government health officials or state exco members responsible for health, as well as mass media reports and anecdotal accounts of actual deaths, which have caused me to ask Chua two specific questions about the number of dengue deaths last year: Were there some 20 dengue deaths in the Federal Territory of Kuala Lumpur alone and not just two cases of deaths? Was the total number of dengue deaths in the country last year in three digits or in the region of a hundred deaths and not just 57? The Health Ministry has not revealed any figures about the incidence of dengue cases and deaths this year, although there are at least ten dengue deaths - with four cases in the Ipoh general hospital, one case each in Kuantan and Kota Bahru, one case in Port Dickson and four cases in Kuala Lumpur. But these could only be a portion of the true and full data about the number of dengue deaths in the new year. The deadly aedes mosquito which spreads the lethal dengue disease strikes without distinction to race, age, gender, political beliefs or location. Recently a member of the royalty came down with dengue. If Chua denies, I am prepared to name the state this happened. The Health Ministry has mishandled the worst dengue epidemic in the nation's history and as a result, every unnecessary and avoidable death has been denied the most basic and fundamental of human rights - the right to live - and should be the subject of Suhakam concern and investigation. Last July, the World Health Organisation (WHO) issued a warning to the region of a possible dengue pandemic on the scale of the worst recorded dengue year of 1998 and urged governments to take effective action against the mosquitoes which spread the infection. The WHO disease control specialist Dr. Mike Nathan had then warned: "This year is looking a bit like 1998 when we had a pandemic. It's a very worrying picture". Nathan lamented: "Countries declare a state of emergency when the disease is upon them, but that's really too late. In most affected countries, lots of money gets thrown at an epidemic, but not in the intervening period." 1998 was also the worst recorded year for dengue for Singapore, when it recorded 5,258 dengue cases and one dengue death (as compared to 27,379 dengue cases and 58 deaths in Malaysia for the same year). Singapore was also included in the WHO warning last July of a possible dengue pandemic in the region, and there was a marked rise in the incidence of dengue cases in August and September in the island republic. However, in less than five months by the end of November last year, the Singapore government announced that it had "successfully curbed" the dengue menace in Singapore and the dengue situation was returning to normal "despite the active transmission of dengue in the region". Singapore last year reported 3,937 dengue cases and eight DHF cases, much lower than the 5,258 dengue cases in 1998. Why could Singapore heed the WHO warning last July of a possible dengue pandemic to bring the deadly disease under control and save lives but not Malaysia where it has ballooned into the worst dengue epidemic in the nation's history? This question is posed not so much to question the efficiency of the Health Ministry to bring the dengue epidemic under control, but from the human rights dimension for its denial of the mother of all human rights - the right to live! I have been advised that no one can be sure how long the current worst dengue epidemic will continue, that it could be another four, six or eight months. This means that we are staring at the terrible prospect of the continued mishandling of the worst dengue epidemic in the nation's history taking the lives of some 100 people after having caused the death of about 100 people already. There are other aspects of human rights violations in the mishandling of the worst dengue epidemic in the nation's history, including the right to information and press freedom, which will be the subject of a later report and complaint to Suhakam. (27/1/2003) * Lim Kit Siang, DAP National Chairman