Health experts on Wednesday urged to accelerate the efforts to achieve national health goals by combating malaria and other high burden diseases.
They were addressing a seminar organized by Directorate of Malaria Control (DMC) and Save the Children to mark the World Malaria Day being observed with the theme “Sustain gains, save lives: invest in Malaria”.
They said globally, every year almost 225 million people fall ill with malaria and 780,000 lose their lives. Additional Secretary, Ministry of Inter-Provincial Coordination (IPC), Furqan Bahadur Khan acknowledged the role that Directorate of Malaria Control and Save the Children are playing their role in counting malaria out of the country.
He said that the federal government is making all efforts to control diseases like malaria and asked the provinces to share their responsibility to ensure that they have capacity to control such diseases. He thanked the donor agencies for their assistance to support malaria control initiatives in Pakistan.
Director DMC, Muhammad Aslam said that malaria is among the six priority health programmes in the country. He added Pakistan being an active member of Global Roll Back Malaria Program partnership and supporter of WHO Global Malaria Program has been fully engaged and committed for its national health goal.
He said since 2001, Pakistan has made tangible progress in achieving the five years targets of national Rollback Malaria Project. National strategies and policy guidelines have been fully aligned with the WHO Regional Strategic Plans, he added.
He said introduction and expansion of new and effective interventions including the use Rapid Diagnostic Tests (RDTs), Artemesinin based Combination Therapies (ACTs) for the treatment of falciparum malaria and the promotion of long lasting Insecticide treated bed Nets (LLINs) have brought a revolution in diagnosis, treatment and prevention programmes of the country.
He said recently a five-year malaria control project has been initiated by the Global Fund for Aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria (GFATM) that is being implemented in 38 high-risk districts located in Sindh, Balochistan, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and FATA. He said Directorate of Malaria Control (DMC) and Save the Children are the principal recipients of this programme.
Project Director Save the Children Dr. Muhammad Imran, said that the goal can only be achieved if all the actors in all the sectors of health, education, agriculture, environment, information technology on one hand and government, private sectors and community itself on the other hand, engage and participate in malaria control activities.
Highlighting the role of Save the Children in combating malaria, Dr Imran said that Save the Children has been implementing malaria programme in synergy with maternal, child and reproductive health interventions. He said through its Improved Child Health Project in FATA and Afghan Refugee Program in Baluchistan, Rapid Diagnostic Test Centers have been established providing preventive, diagnostic and treatment services within the government health facilities, alongside the capacity building of laboratory technicians in correct diagnosis of malaria. He lauded the role of DMC and GFATM for supporting malaria interventions in Pakistan.