‘Hepatitis-free’ Sindh gets another three years, Rs 5b

KARACHI – After much lobbying and swaying opinions through the media, officials of the Sindh Health Department on Thursday managed to get the provincial government to extend the Hepatitis Prevention and Control Programme for another three years – a project that will cost Rs 5 billion.
The last three-year term, worth Rs.2.70 billion, was set to expire soon, and the Health Department had recently started hepatitis screening of different areas to prove the efficiency of the programme. For the first time, media trips were also arranged to Gadap, as officials sought to convince the people through the media that the lives of many citizens were in danger due to hepatitis.
“The chief minister (CM) has agreed in principle to extend the CM’s Initiative for Hepatitis-Free Sindh for another three years. The extension has been granted in an attempt to encompass the remaining and remote areas of the province with the necessary facilities of screening, vaccination and treatment,” read an official handout issued after CM Qaim Ali Shah’s meeting on Thursday with Health Department officials.
The CM told participants of the meeting that the Health Department’s draft law for regulating private clinics and hospitals was under active consideration, and a decision will soon be taken on the issue. A law is to tie school admissions with vaccinations will also be discussed, the CM said, whereby a certificate guaranteeing that a child has been vaccinated against polio and hepatitis will have to be produced.
The CM also stressed the need to encourage precautionary and preventive measures regarding Hepatitis; he urged organising seminars, symposiums, walks and rallies to create awareness among citizens. He said that a programme to this effect was also initiated from the Prime Minister’s Secretariat, but till now, no scheme had been launched. The CM directed the authorities concerned to claim Sindh’s funds share by contacting the relevant authorities in the Federal government.
Earlier, Sindh Health Minister Dr Sagheer Ahmed and Health Secretary Hashim Zaidi briefed participants of the meeting about the progress made in the Hepatitis programme as well as other schemes and programmes of their department. Chief Minister’s Initiative for Hepatitis-Free Sindh Programme Manager Dr Abdul Majeed Chutto informed the meeting that programme was launched in 2008-09 at a cost of Rs 2.9 billion. The goal of the scheme was to prevent acute infections, addressing chronic infections, raising public awareness, and the strengthening of the health system.
According to details of vaccination against Hepatitis-B, as many as 1,135,000 individuals – 139,843 in high-risk population, 775,000 newborns, 18,439 for prison inmates, and 1,500,000 auto destructible syringes for public sector hospitals – was carried out from 2008 to 2011.
The programme manager further said that four molecular biology laboratories have been established in Karachi, Hyderabad, Larkana and Mirpurkhas. As many as 80,000 patients have been treated against Hepatitis-C, 500 patients against Hepatitis-D and 1,261 patients have been treated in jails, he added.