Malaria looms large in Bardiya

Nearly 120 people have been diagnosed with malaria in the last 10 months in Bardiya district alone. Organizing a press meet here on Thursday, Dr Guna Raj Lohani, the medical superintendent at Bardiya Hospital said that 11 patients were suffering from fatal malaria called plasmodium falciparum. "Hundred-and-five other patients are suffering from plasmodium vivax, considered less dangerous than falciparum," he added. An official however, claimed that the number of fatal plasmodium falciparum patients had been gradually decreasing in the district.