NWFP Minister for Health, Syed Zahir Ali Shah has formally handed over vehicles, provided by KFW to all the District TB Officers to strengthen mechanism of monitoring and supervision of anti-TB activities to control the disease effectively in the province.
The special ceremony arranged for handing over the vehicles at Health secretariat in Peshawar on Tuesday was attended by Director Public health Dr Fazal Qauyum, Manager TB Control Programme, Dr Abdul Ghafoor KFW representative Maqsood, EDOs Helath and District TB Officers. It is worth mentioning here that German Bank, KFW had provided 28 vehicles to improve monitoring and supervision of TB Control activities.
The Health Minister hoped that with the provision of these vehicles mobility of TB officer would improve and their activities would be accelerate. He lauded KFW for the assistance and ordered concerned officers to utilise these vehicles only for anti TB purpose.
He also termed achievements in controlling TB in the province, as remarkable. However, he asked to identify the real causes of the disease to check its spread effectively. The Minister also ordered replacement of the TB officers who were not performing satisfactorily. He assured all out support for continuation and strengthening of the programme.
Dr Abdul Ghafoor, Manager Province TB Control Programme while highlighting achievements of the programme said that 74 per cent detection and 93 per cent cure rate had been achieved in the province. "It was beyond the target set by WHO", he remarked. He declared beside the 200 diagnostic and 800 treatment centres free quality drugs were also available in the province.
He said that 32800 TB patients had been provided free treatment last year. The manager informed that private sector had been involved successfully in combating TB in the province. "Private sector is contributing 18 per cent in anti TB activities, which is more than any other province", he remarked. Dr Ghafoor announced that a state of the art TB reference laboratory would be established at Hayatabad Medical Complex this year.