ISLAMABAD: Alarmed by the reported positive cases in Lahore, the federal health authorities have sounded a dengue alert in the capital, Dawn has learnt.

The secretary of the Capital Administration and Development Division (CADD) has in this regard sent advisories to all the hospitals working under the administrative control of the division, the executive director of Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences, Prof Mehmood Jamal told Dawn.

Mr Jamal said: “The departments concerned are prepared to deal with dengue and in this regard all the preventive measures have been taken.”

He said that an isolation ward at Pims had been dedicated for dengue patients.

“Twenty beds have been reserved for dengue patients while in case of any outbreak of the disease, Pims has the capacity to tackle 100 patients,” said Prof Jamal.

He said Pims maintained good stock of platelet, the essential ingredients for the treatment of the disease.

According to experts, if timely treatment is not provided, the disease may turn into life-threatening dengue hemorrhagic fever.

The fever may lead to bleeding, low levels of platelets and blood plasma leakage, or into dengue shock syndrome– a dangerously low blood pressure.

“The blood bank will also have a separate desk to manage the demand of blood and platelets,” added the executive director.

“We have learnt a lot from previous experience when we ran out of platelets and this time we also have platelets kits,” said the official.

He said the National Institute of Health would assist in early diagnosis of the disease.

The Federal Government Services Hospital (Polyclinic) has also reserved around 20 beds for the dengue patients and established a separate counter for them, the spokesman for the hospital said. Besides, it had sufficient blood stock.

The ICT administration has specifically reserved funds this year to deal with the dengue outbreak.

The deputy commissioner Amir Ali Ahmed told Dawn: “They were prepared to meet dengue outbreak not only in urban areas but rural as well.”

He said special funds had been reserved for rural areas and “an anti-dengue fumigation campaign will also be run there.”