On the instructions of Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz, the Ministry of Health will provide free diagnostic and treatment facilities to 152 educational institutions of Multan district. This was stated by Mian Faisal Mukhtar City District Nazim while presiding over a meeting of health officers here on Monday.
Sixty dispensers and health technicians would be hired on daily wages to get the tests, blood screening of 1,25000 girl, boy students in first phase, he said.
In second phase blood screening of students of religious seminaries, private educational institutions, employees of restaurants, hotels, and bakeries and free vaccination would be provided to make Multan a hepatitis free district, he added.
Free diagnostic and treatment facilities will also be provided in teaching and District Headquarters Hospitals (DHQs) for patients suffering from hepatitis B and C across the country, he maintained.
Mian Faisal Mukhtar said that Federal Government had provided vaccine for 1,25,000 people. Similarly, I00,000 disposable syringes were supplied by Punjab Government. District Government was establishing a diagnostic laboratory with an estimated cost of Rs 2.6 million.
According to official sources, 13,000 patients are receiving free treatment of hepatitis B and C under the Prime Minister's Programme for Prevention and Control of Hepatitis.
He said country's 60 hospitals were already being provided treatment services for hepatitis to the most deserving patients of all four provinces. Hepatitis Management Committees have been formed in every District Hospital to ensure the system transparent.
Sources said the Injection Interferon and Capsule Ribavirin are available in sufficient quantity at Polyclinic, PIMS and NIH stores and are being issued to the deserving population.
Under the programme launched in September 2005, the Ministry of Health has planned a comprehensive strategy for prevention and treatment of hepatitis B and C. The ministry has started hepatitis B vaccination of all infants and behaviour change communication, strengthening of safe blood transfusion services and establishment of proper hospital waste management system.
Through these measures, the Ministry of Health is trying its level best to facilitate the provincial health departments for prevention and control of vial hepatitis, the sources said.