Another confirmed case of indigenous dengue fever was identified today (October 8) in Nanzih District, adding one more case to this year’s (2025) dengue epidemic in Kaohsiung City which had accumulated 13 cases. The new case was a Taiwanese female in her thirties. She consulted the doctor on October 7 because of fever, muscle soreness, bone pain, etc. As this rings the alarm, the doctor administered the rapid test on the spot and found it a NS1 positive case. The patient was then hospitalized for treatment in isolation. Laboratory test confirmed the case as PCR positive for DENV-I, which was different from cases in the earlier Gushan District epidemic for which alert has been lifted. For this confirmed case, the Department of Health (DOH) has implemented extended epidemic investigation and specimen sampling on 156 persons in the areas of her residence and workplace. No other suspected case has been found until now. Specimen of the confirmed case will be sent to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) for DNA sequencing to clarify the source of infection.
For this new confirmed case, Kaohsiung City Government’s epidemic control taskforce has activated the emergency disease prevention work upon notification, including mandatory blanket inspection of breeding grounds and spraying of pesticides in the case’s residence and the surrounding alert zone. In addition, the epidemic control taskforce has identified a total of 69 water-holding containers, with 10 of them having bred vector larvae. According to the Communicable Disease Control Act, owners, users, and managers of all public and private venues should keep stringent environmental management and exercise the due care in maintenance. For the identified cases of breeding of vector mosquitoes, a maximum fine of NT$15,000 would be imposed.
DOH reminded the public that dengue fever generally has an incubation period of 3 to 8 days (about 14 days at maximum). A person bitten by the virus-carrying mosquito may not show any symptoms immediately, but is capable of spreading the virus after infection during the viremic period (1 day before onset to 5 days thereafter). Citizens who have visited or resided in the 6 villages (Cuiping, Renchang, Hongchang, Jiachang, Ruiping, and Jintian) in Nanzih District in the past two weeks should consult a doctor as promptly as possible to do a rapid test if “any one” of the suspected dengue symptoms emerges, such as fever, headache, pain behind the eyes, muscle and joint pain, and rashes, and take the initiative to inform the doctor of their activity history. Physicians are also reminded to stay alert, adopt the TOCC (travel history, occupation, contact history, and cluster information) inquiry and perform rapid tests.