Government has equipped 104 hospitals to diagnose hepatitis patients through surveillance system, adding that 150 hospitals would be provided with the facility by the year's end.
This was stated by Dr Sharif Ahmad, Manager Prime Minister's Programme for Prevention and Control of Hepatitis while speaking in a Media Orientation function held here at a local hotel on Monday.
Citing 220 studies conducted at the premier health institutes, he said Hepatitis B and C was prevalent among 3-4 per cent and 5-6 per cent of the population. According to a WHO's study, he said that one person in Pakistan received 13 injections per year, the highest in the world which is stated to be the prime reason for the disease.
About 25 per cent of the Hepatitis C patients do not need injections and subsided itself, he said, adding that the patients should undergo certain tests before being put on injectable medication.
Furthermore, studies had proved that 60 per cent of the injection were effective globally. He said that PM's programme in collaboration with the Pakistan Medical and Research Council was collecting 49,000 blood samples to ascertain the magnitude of the disease. He said that seven satellite laboratories were being established for testing water quality besides installation of 148 triple-chambered incinerators to put brakes on the ailment.
"Blood-borne types of hepatitis B and C are caused of re-use of syringes, unscreened blood transfusion, piercing ears and nose with contaminated needles, shaving at the barbars's hops," he said.
Dr Sharif Ahmad said that health workers were more vulnerable to hepatitis, saying that about 10 per cent of the health workers in the federal hospitals had recently been tested positive for C type of the blood-borne disease.
"Some 6 percent have been diagnosed to have Hepatitis B in a screening carried out among health workers at the health institutes of the federal capital Islamabad," said, Manager of the Prime Minister's Programme for Prevention and Control of Hepatitis DrSharif Ahmad Khan. He said the PM's Rs 2.593 billion five-year programme (2005-10), was aiming to reduced the disease by 50 per cent through putting in place preventive measures coupled with curative steps.
The measures included hospital waste management, provision of safe water and sanitation to put brakes A and E type of the disease and public awareness on hygiene. Dr Aamir Ghafoor focal person of the PM programme for the NWFP that had provided free treatment to 1,200 patients, but treatment was no remedy. The solution lies in prevention, he said.
He said that the 54 per cent of the Hepatitis patients end up suffering from chronic liver diseases. Chief executive of the Hayatabad Medical Complex, Professor Dr Arshad Javaid, they had provided free treatment to 300 patients under the programme, whereas 90 more are being treated.
Of the 619 health workers screened for the disease, 2.4 and 1.6 per cent had been found positive for Hepatitis B and C respectively. Nazim Hayatabad Mohammad Ishraq urged the authorities concerned to accord top priority to merit as far as provision of free treatment of patients was concerned.
He said that the top health officials should stop intervention in the programme to ensure its smooth sailing.District Nazim Ghulam Ali on the occasion announced that the under-construction burn hospital would be commissioned as first-ever hepatitis hospital of the province. He said that the provincial government had already started construction of two burn units in the city due to which there was no need of a third burn hospital."Of the 2,800 people screened for the disease, 2,300 had been diagnosed positive either for B or C in a free camp held in Palosai locality," he said.
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