Japanese Encephalitis toll rises to 332 in UP

With three more children succumbing to the killer Japanese Encephalitis virus on Monday, the death toll in eastern Uttar Pradesh has now gone up to 332.

"Of these, there were 305 children and 27 grown-ups," an official spokesman told this scribe in Lucknow on Monday . 

According to him, "As many as 1,942 cases of Japanese Encephalitis were detected during the current monsoon season, when the virus spreads."

He said, "The districts affected by the disease are Gorakhpur, Kushinagar, Deoria, Maharajganj, Sant Kabir Nagar, Basti, Siddharth Nagar."

Dr K P Kushwaha, who heads the Encephalitis unit at the BR Medical College in Gorakhpur, that has become the nodal centre for dealing with JE across the affected districts, said, "We also receive a lot of patients from neighbouring Bihar."

As per hospital records, about 250 patients admitted over the past two months were from Bihar.