YEARS
[PHOTO - Residents scavange
burnt remains after a fire set off by New Year's fireworks engulfed shanty homes
in Manila, Philippines, on Sunday. JAY DIRECTO/AFP/GETTY
IMAGES]
MANILA, JANUARY 6, 2012 (STAR)
By Sheila Crisostomo - The Department of Health (DOH) yesterday
declared the New Year revelry for 2012 as the deadliest in 20 years with three
people killed from firecracker blasts.
"This year is the deadliest of all the years that the DOH has monitored
injuries. We did not expect deaths from firecracker injuries, rather just
amputations and blast burns," said DOH Assistant Secretary Eric Tayag.
Tayag said the DOH started the surveillance for firecracker and stray
bullet-related injuries two decades ago.
He said the DOH had monitored deaths from firecrackers in 2009 with two cases
and then this year with three cases.
The first victim was a 10-year-old boy from Cabanatuan City who suffered
massive injuries and broken bones when the gunpowder that he collected and threw
into flames in a steel drum exploded on New Year's Eve.
The next victim was a four-month-old boy who was hit in the left eye by a
home-made "boga" on Dec. 29 in Bacolod City, while the third victim was a
21-year-old man from Nueva Ecija who sustained massive abdominal injuries due to
the powerful blast from an oversized firecracker "Goodbye Philippines" on New
Year's Eve.
Tayag said they observed that more powerful and illegal firecrackers started
coming out five years ago and this apparently led to the first fatalities in
2009.
"Having deaths from fireworks is very, very serious. We have to do something
about that," he said.
Aside from the three deaths from firecracker blasts, the DOH had also
recorded another fatality – a 20-year-old woman from Sulu who was hit by a stray
bullet in the head while watching television inside her home on New Year's Eve.
The victim was three months pregnant.
Tayag said the victim went into coma until she died last Thursday.
The surveillance showed that from 6 a.m of Dec. 21 to 6 a.m. of Jan. 5, there
was a total of 1,004 firecracker and stray bullet injuries and fireworks
ingestion in 50 hospitals under the DOH.
This figure is four cases or 0.4 percent higher than the same period last
year.
Of the 1,004 cases, 970 were caused by firecrackers, 29 by stray bullets and
five by fireworks ingestion.
Records showed that 512 of the cases were active users or directly handled
firecrackers, while 441 were caused by illegal firecrackers, 241 of them from
piccolo.
Four hundred four injuries were due to legal fireworks, with kwitis
accounting for 157 of them.
Tayag reiterated calls to people who sustained firecracker-related injuries
and burns to get anti-tetanus shots before infection sets in.
"It may be too late if you get a shot after symptoms have manifested. Our
tetanus watch is until Jan. 21 because the incubation period for tetanus is 21
days. So you still have time to see your doctor now," Tayag
warned.
Chief News Editor: Sol Jose Vanzi
© Copyright, 2012 by PHILIPPINE
HEADLINE NEWS ONLINE
All rights reserved
PHILIPPINE HEADLINE NEWS
ONLINE [PHNO] WEBSITE
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