Health workers in the Kargal region of Karnataka’s Shivamogga district have been engaged in ensuring people in the hilly terrains are vaccinated against Covid-19 over the past year. Now that everyone except around 300 out of 10,000 people have been administered at least one dose of the Covid-19 vaccine, health workers face another challenge – Kyasanur Forest Disease (KFD), or otherwise known as Monkey Fever, according to The News Minute report.
Monkey fever is a tick-borne viral haemorrhagic fever endemic to this part of the Western Ghats. Rathnamma and Harshita, two health workers, have been trying to convince the residents of the village to take the monkey fever, with little success. “We have hiked through forests with 100 doses of the vaccine against KFD, and been able to convince just 10 to take it. People think that monkey fever is not a threat to them; or for many, they are tired of vaccines. They’ve already taken COVID-19 vaccines, and some have taken KFD vaccines previously. They ask why we keep forcing them to take vaccines,” Harshita, paid barely Rs 11,000, was quoted by The News Minute as saying.
Kargal village has seen three cases and two deaths since 2019, when there was a large outbreak in the neighbouring Aralagodu village. Subsequently, nearly 7,661 out of 10,362 people (above the age of six who are eligible for the Monkey Fever vaccine) took the first dose. But a month later, only 4,674 people came forward to take a second dose. Less than 17% of the eligible population in the village have taken a booster dose.
Vaccine drives are important for the disease, whose mortality rates can be as high as 10%. Rathnamma says that it takes a lot of effort to convince people to take KFD vaccines. “We can do it if this was our sole focus. But we have to monitor COVID-19 here, as well as carry out other health surveillance activities,” she says. Rathnamma and Harshita also have to manage the absence of a doctor in Kargal healthcentre.
KFD, unlike Covid-19, requires multiple booster shots for it to work. The Karnataka government procures over 2.9 lakh vaccines against Monkey Fever annually. A majority of these vaccines are allocated to the Shivamogga district, which has become the hotspot for the disease.
Deputy Director of Virus Diagnostic Laboratory (VDL), Raghunandan, in Shivamogga, which is the nodal agency for monitoring KFD in Karnataka, says that Covid-19 has put a dent in their goal of achieving monkey fever vaccination drives by the end of December.
Raghunandan told The News Minute that a KFD shot can only be taken 14 days after a Covid shot, making it more difficult for health workers to keep track of who has to be given doses. He also acknowledged that health workers are overburdened because of Covid-19 vaccine drive. “But we do hope to catch up.”
Covid-19, however, has not just messed up KFD vaccination drive but has also affected reporting of the disease. The VDL receives approximately 7,000 samples of suspected KFD cases annually. Since the pandemic, the number has dropped to 4,000. Officials and health care workers say this might be due to fear of reporting fevers, as they would have to be quarantined if tested Covid-19 positive.
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