It is estimated that 3.9 billion people around the world are at risk of infection with dengue viruses, with 70% of that population resides in Southeast Asia and the Western Pacific region. To respond to the escalating dengue outbreaks worldwide and to reinforce the regional capacity for tackling the disease while sharing Taiwan’s experiences, the Taiwan Centers for Disease Control (Taiwan CDC) has been implementing the New Southbound Dengue Prevention and Control Collaboration Program since 2018. Taiwan CDC has been conducting exchanges with Indonesia regarding strategies for dengue surveillance and prevention as well as technical expertise. From March 11 and 15, 2019, Taiwan CDC hosted the first Technical Training Workshop on Dengue Control and invited 10 practitioners from relevant prevention and control agencies to attend the workshop. The workshop aimed to improve dengue prevention and control outcomes in both Taiwan and Indonesia, and to ensure the health and wellbeing of the people in both countries.

Last year, Taiwan CDC started the New Southbound Dengue Prevention and Control Collaboration Program, which entails the organization of training workshops, the creation of disease response teams to conduct practical exchanges, sharing of Taiwan’s experiences concerning 6 major focuses including disease surveillance, application of the geographic information system (GIS), health education, community involvement, and clinical treatment with Indonesia. Furthermore, a contact network was established, and a teaching model tailored to meet local demands based on Taiwan’s dengue prevention and control model was created. This year’s program aims to continuously strengthen collaboration efforts on dengue prevention and control with Indonesia, provide technical training courses that suit Indonesia’s needs, and promote community-based disease prevention practices to enhance regional capacity and reduce the threat posed to the health and wellbeing of the people by cross-border outbreaks.
Thus far this year, as of March 12, a cumulative total of 69 imported dengue cases have been confirmed, which is the highest among those reported during the same period in the past decade. Among this year’s imported cases, 19 were imported from Indonesia. Over the past 4 years, 8-31% of the cases acquired infection in Indonesia. For this workshop, Taiwan CDC specially invited Professor Tu Wu-chun (杜武俊) from the Department of Entomology of National Chung Hsing University, who is the principal investigator of this year’s New Southbound Dengue Prevention and Control Collaboration Program. Professor Tu introduced the vector mosquito behavior and shared the prevention measures that help travelers visiting areas affected by dengue fever to ward off infection. In addition, Professor Tu also advised the public to use mosquito repellents containing DEET to optimize protection against mosquito bites.
Taiwan CDC reminds travelers planning to visit areas affected by dengue fever to take precautions against mosquito bites, including wearing light-colored clothing, long sleeves and long pants, applying officially approved mosquito repellent to exposed parts of the body, staying at accommodations installed with window screens, screen doors or air conditioners. If symptoms such as fever, headache, retroorbital pain, myalgia, arthralgia, and rash develop after their return, please seek immediate medical attention and inform the physician of their travel activity history in order to facilitate early diagnosis, case reporting and treatment. For more information, please visit the Taiwan CDC website at https://www.cdc.gov.tw or call the toll-free Communicable Disease Reporting and Consultation Hotline, 1922 (or 0800-001922).