In order to curb rising HIV/AIDS cases in the province the Sindh HIV/AIDS Control Programme has failed to meet its targets. Sources in the Sindh Health Department told Business Recorder that the HIV/AIDS Control Programme initiated to eliminate the menace from the province but since its inception it was only able to organise seminars and did not undertake anything concrete in this regard.
The international donor agencies have recently asked the government to expedite its efforts to avert a looming danger of HIV/AIDS spread. Pakistan was declared as low prevalence but a highrisk country. Over 2,300 AIDS patients have been reported so far in the country whereas the total number of people infected with the virus could be as high as 70,000 or above.
Sindh was the most effected province in the country where an outbreak of HIV was discovered among injecting drug users in Larkana. Out of 170 people tested and more than 20 were found HIV positive, sources said.
They said that the control programme should check road-side barbers where people go for cheep hair-cutting or shaves. Their instruments are highly infected and it could carry HIV or Hepatitis infections. They should also test all jail inmates in step by step programme, because these places also identified as red zone for the infection.
It was estimated that 40 percent of blood transfusions were not screened for HIV, sources said. Some 20 percent of the blood transfused came from professional donors, which are often drug user and infected with Hepatitis C & B and HIV, they added.
The authority should ensure mandatory screening of blood and blood products in the public and private sectors for all major blood-borne infections. The HIV/AIDS control programme should conduct education campaigns to promote voluntary blood donation and develop quality assurance systems for public and private blood banks to ensure that all blood is properly screened for HIV and Hepatitis B.
Sources also said that the unsterilised instruments used by the dental surgeons and quacks for teeth treatments could be the carriers of contagious diseases and some times invites HIV AIDS.
The instruments used by some of the dentists and most of the quacks were spreading the infectious disease as they were used for hundreds of the patients without getting it sterilised, they added.
They said even the syringes were used by the health officials/workers in their clinics/hospitals to administer Anaesthesia to the patients and the same syringes were used the same to other patients also carry Hepatitis C & B and HIV/AIDS.
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