Source: Xinhua| 2020-04-08 17:54:14|Editor: Xiaoxia

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JAKARTA, April 8 (Xinhua) -- The number of casualties and cases of dengue fever has more than doubled from March to April across Indonesia, the Health Ministry reported.

Data from the Health Ministry at the beginning of this month revealed that the death toll from the flu-like illness rose significantly to 254 with the number of cases spiking 39,876.

Those are compared with 94 deaths and 14,716 cases recorded by the ministry at the beginning the previous month.

"Now is the transition period of seasons. There are more dengue fever cases in provinces. Stay at home and destroy mosquito nests," Achmad Yurianto, spokesman for the COVID-19-related matters told a press conference on Wednesday.

Indonesia's East Nusa Tenggara province followed by provinces of West Java province and East Java posts the biggest number of casualties, media reported on Wednesday.

On the number of cases, West Java province, followed by East Nusa Tenggara province and Lampung province, logs the highest figure, the ministry said.

"West Java and East Nusa Tenggara provinces have to be alert on the dengue fever, because they have recorded the highest number of cases," Siti Nadia Tarmizi, the ministry's Director of Prevention and Control of Vector-borne Disease and Zoonoses, said two days earlier.

Dengue fever is a mosquito-borne disease resulted from one of four closely related dengue viruses. The disease is transmitted by the bite of an aedes mosquito, especially an aedes aegypti mosquito, infected with dengue virus.

The dengue fever is the fastest spreading mosquito-borne viral disease in the world. The infection commonly takes place in urban environment.