Cuttack: The reporting of dengue cases have dropped significantly at SCB Medical College and Hospital here over the past few days with the onset of winter.

About 50 to 100 dengue positive cases were being reported every day at the outdoor departments of SCB the past monsoon, with an average of 15 to 50 cases requiring admission every day till about a week ago. But over the past week, their number has gone down to 20 to 50 a day, with an average of three to five cases requiring admission.

"Only five cases were admitted from among the seventy persons who underwent blood tests since Thursday," said assistant nodal officer for treatment of dengue cases at SCB Sriprasad Mohanty.

He added that 15 dengue patients were undergoing treatment at SCB at present. Of them, two are in the ICU.

Mohanty attributed the fall in the number of dengue patients to a dip in the mercury. He hoped that the dengue cas-es would continue to fall even more in the coming few weeks.

Dengue-virus carrying mosquitoes cannot survive in low temperature.

Some 11, 877 blood samples were tested for dengue at SCB since June 14 and 2,288 patients were admitted.

SCB received dengue patients from almost all districts of the state the last monsoon. But, more than 85 per cent cases were reported from coastal districts, such as Balasore, Bhadrak, Kendrapara, Jagatsinghpur, Jajpur, Cuttack, Khurda and Puri.