Nipah: 22 lives lost in six years

MALAPPURAM: 22 lives have been lost in Nipah in the state in the last six years. Nipah was first reported in Kozhikode in 2018. 23 people were infected by the Nipah wave in May 2018. 17 people, including Lini Puthussery, the nurse at Perambra Taluk Hospital, died. One person died in 2021 and two each in 2023 and 2024. The last victim was a 24-year-old man from Naduvathu in Thiruvali on September 9. On July 20, a 14-year-old boy died at Chemprassery in Pandikkad.

The second outbreak of Nipah was in Ernakulam, in 2019. Though a 23-year-old student contracted Nipah, his life could be saved. The disease was confined to one person. In September 2021, the third wave of Nipah at Chathamangalam in Kozhikode claimed the life of a 12-year-old boy. In 2023, two people died of Nipah in Kozhikode. Two Nipah deaths in the nearby areas of Malappuram district in the last two months have added to the concern. Pandikkad Chemprassery is within a radius of 15 km from Naduvath, where the Nipah death occurred. Samples of fruit bats taken from a radius of five kilometres here were found to contain antibodies to the Nipah virus. Bats were found in the area where the deceased, a 14-year-old boy, had consumed Hog Plum along with his friends. None of his friends were infected with Nipah.

There is no bat habitat near the house of the youth who tested positive for Nipah in Naduvath. At the same time, there are bat habitats in various parts of the panchayat. According to his relatives, the youth had plucked bilimbi from a tree near his house and ate it. Various studies by the ICMR have found that fruit bats are the epicentre of the disease.

The first case of Nipah virus was reported in 2001 in Siliguri in West Bengal. Of the 66 cases, 45 died. Nipah was first confirmed in 1998 in Kampung Sungai Nipah in Malaysia. That's how the name Nipah came about.