The Prime Minister's Office (PMO) today issued a set of directives asking concerned government agencies to launch a social awareness campaign to negate rumours leading to fatal incidents and check spread of dengue fever, a PM office spokesman said.

“The meeting asked concerned ministries and offices to create a social resistance involving all the stakeholders including local communities to stop spread of rumours and dengue menace,” PM’s speech writer Md Nazrul Islam told a media briefing emerging from an inter-ministerial coordination meeting.

He said the directives were issued in line with instructions of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, now on an official visit to the UK, from where she was monitoring the current flood situation as well.

Islam said the premier simultaneously instructed the officials concerned to minimise sufferings of the deluge victims alongside damages feared to be caused by the flood.

He said representatives from the concerned ministries and city corporations also came up with various opinions and spelled out their strategies to check rumours, dengue and face the flood.

Principal Coordinator of SDG Affairs at the PMO Md Abul Kalam Azad and Executive Chairman of Bangladesh Investment Development Authority (BIDA) Kazi M Aminul Islam were, among others, who joined the meeting chaired by PMO Secretary Sajjadul Hassan.

“The PMO asked the authorities concerned of the two Dhaka city corporations to strengthen their anti-mosquito drives to check dengue,” the spokesman said.

It also instructed the health authorities to form a special medical team in each city hospital to ensure smooth and proper treatment for the dengue patients. Decision was also taken to observe a dengue “awareness week” from Thursday.

The PMO asked all government officials to clean their respective offices and to prevent dengue alongside motivating people to keep their residences and neighbourhoods clean by removing stagnant clean water from different pots, particularly flower tubes, air conditioner machines and refrigerators.