Federal government taking serious note of rise in infectious diseases in flood-hit areas of the country, on Saturday constituted National Infectious Diseases Task Force (NIDTF) to keep an eye on the situation and suggest remedial measures to avoid the spread of infectious diseases.
The task force was assigned collection of comprehensive information about health conditions in flood affected areas to identify and pre-empt epidemics outbreak, sources in Health Ministry said. They said the NIDTF will share its information with response teams and relief personnel present in the flood hit area to help co-ordinate relief efforts.
Dr Rasheed Jumma, Director General Health will head the NIDTF while National Co-ordinator, Health Emergency and Preparedness, Dr Jehanzeb Aurakzai, Executive Director of the National Institute of Health, Dr Birjees Kazi, WHO Representative to Pakistan, Dr Guido Sabatinelli, Chief Health of UNICEF, Dr Mohammed Cisse, Adviser of FELTP Pakistan, Dr Jawad Asghar, Dr Adnan Khan, Reproductive Health Co-ordinator of the Ministry of Health and Representative of MSF, Pieroluigi Testa will be members of the task force.
The displacement of people and the environmental disaster due to standing water may result in number of health problems including diarrhea and skin ailments. In addition to these immediate concerns, a number of additional health threats are anticipated in the coming days as displaced persons staying in make-shift camps have limited sanitation, food, medicine and water supply.
The federal ministry and provincial health departments along with international and civil society partners are working tirelessly to remedy the situation. A major need is the ability to identify disease outbreaks as early as possible and mobilise resources to control them before they escalate in the form of epidemic.
The ministry and the WHO have set up a monitoring cell in flood affected areas. The cell is active and is receiving health reports regularly from flood affected areas and is co-ordinating with the provincial health departments and relief teams from public and private sectors to improve the situation.