PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa health department has asked Kohat’s district administration to level the Afghan refugee camps recently demolished to eliminate water puddles and deny breeding grounds to mosquitoes following a surge in dengue cases in the area.

During a meeting chaired by health secretary Fayaz Ali Shah and attended by acting Director-General (Health Services) Dr Naeem Awan and others, officials discussed the dengue situation in the province.

It emerged that Kohat was reporting the highest number of dengue cases in the province after Peshawar.

Officials identified the demolished refugee camps in the district as one of the possible reasons for the increase in infections and decided to take the district administration on board to level the camps to eliminate ditches where stagnant water could provide mosquito breeding sites.

They said the health secretary wrote letters not only to the district administration of Kohat but also to Mansehra and Haripur’s, where a similar situation existed as the camps vacated by Afghan refugees and subsequently demolished could become sources of an increase in the mosquito population in case of further rains.

District admin asked to level demolished refugee camps over stagnant water

The officials said there was no dengue outbreak in Kohat, with the cases being reported sporadically, but hospitals had been alerted and isolation beds allocated in case of an outbreak.

They said sufficient materials had been transported to Kohat to spray stagnant water pools and carry out contact tracing to prevent dengue spread.

Meanwhile, a weekly report released by the Integrated Diseases Surveillance and Response System said the province-wide tally of confirmed dengue cases rose to 392 from 339 recorded last week.

Peshawar topped the list with 165 cases, followed by Kohat with 118, Bannu with 19 and Mansehra with 18, while the remaining 19 affected districts reported fewer cases. This week, Kohat recorded 33 dengue cases and Peshawar 13.

Officials said the health department had sought the levelling of the refugee camp grounds in Kohat, Haripur and Mansehra following recent rains that left behind pools of stagnant water, which could serve as breeding sites for mosquitoes, the carriers and transmitters of dengue.

The overall dengue situation remained under control. As of August 2025, the province had recorded more than 1,000 cases, which have dropped to 392.

The IDS&RS report said anti-dengue activities were in progress throughout the province to ensure the elimination of larvae.

It added that in 12 districts where a total of 2,077 dengue cases had been reported, breeding sites for dengue larvae had been destroyed through chemical and mechanical means.

According to the report, preventive measures are also in progress. Until now, 64,242 awareness sessions have been conducted, with 245,590 women and 53,329 men participating. The exercise is meant to raise awareness about the causes of dengue, measures to protect from mosquito bites and eliminating breeding sites.

The report said the Public Health Reference Lab at the Khyber Medical University, Peshawar, continued to receive samples from suspected patients transported through courier services.

It added that mosquito larvae found in 344 houses out of a total of 215,200 inspected by workers had been destroyed.

The report also revealed the destruction of 699 containers out of a total of 680,781 and 168 outdoor sites out of 21,549.

It said the chronic challenge faced by the health department was the lack of coordination by medical teaching institutions, which were not sharing data on dengue patients.

Published in Dawn, August 23rd, 2026