More than 1,000 people have died from dengue fever in Bangladesh since the start of the year, according to official figures, in the worst outbreak of the mosquito-borne disease on record in the country.

According to the data released yesterday, Sunday, evening by the country’s Ministry of Health, 1,006 people have died out of the more than 200,000 confirmed to have contracted dengue fever.

According to former director of health services Be-Nazir Ahmed, the number of recorded deaths since the beginning of the year is higher than that of all previous years combined since 2000, the year Bangladesh recorded its first dengue outbreak.

“This is a large-scale health event, both for Bangladesh and for the whole world,” he told AFP.

“The epidemic is putting enormous pressure on the health system” of Bangladesh, World Health Organization (WHO) chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said last month at an online press conference.

Dengue is a disease endemic to tropical regions and causes high fever, headaches, nausea, vomiting, myalgias and, in the most severe cases, bleeding that can lead to death.

Dengue and other diseases caused by mosquito-borne viruses are spreading faster and further due to climate change, the WHO warns.