Sri Lanka’s hospitals have exceeded their capacity in response to the surge in reported dengue patients, the Ministry of Health said, as the Acting Director of the National Dengue Control Unit confirmed that 21 people have died of the disease so far this year — five of them school students.
Dr. Kapila Kannangara, Acting Director of the National Dengue Control Unit, set out the toll in remarks reported by NewsFirst, marking the first time the schoolchildren proportion of the death count has been publicly itemised this cycle. The pressure on inpatient capacity comes as case counts continue to climb above the 35,000 islandwide milestone the National Dengue Control Unit recorded earlier this month, and as Ada Derana separately reported that islandwide cases had exceeded 39,000.
In response, the Ministry of Public Administration, Home Affairs, Provincial Councils and Local Government has stepped up the planned vector-control operation by implementing a Dengue Control Week running from the 15th to the 20th. The drive will cover public places and educational institutions, with the latter category a direct response to the deaths among school students. The week-long programme dovetails with the National Dengue Control Unit’s previously declared nationwide Dengue Control Week beginning June 15 — itself a follow-up to the intensive June 8–10 mosquito control programme across 74 MOH divisions.
Health officials have separately warned that the proliferation has been driven by lingering breeding sites left behind after Cyclone Ditwah, with the first wave of Dengue Day inspections on June 9 finding more than 2,000 larvae across the half of state institutions inspected. The Public Administration ministry’s authority over schools, divisional secretariats and provincial council premises gives the new control week a broader institutional reach than earlier MOH-led drives.
The Ministry of Health did not detail the cumulative case count alongside the death toll, but the 21-death figure represents a sustained climb from the 17 deaths and 32,071 cases recorded in late May and the 19 deaths and 33,572 cases reported as Western Province remained the high-burden zone in early June.
