KARACHI, Jan 29: The Sindh health department is making efforts to obtain a supply of glutomania injections to contain the spread of a skin disease known as leishmania in the interior of the province.

Sindh health minister, Maj. Gen Ahsan Ahmed on Tuesday told Dawn that as leishmania was a very rare disease, drugs for treating the condition were not available in Pakistan.

According to him the drugs were more elusive because they were not registered with the federal health ministry. He claimed that he had approached the federal health minister for permission to import the drugs and on Wednesday, and the first batch of injection supplies, containing about 1000 vials would be sent to the affected areas.

The minister said that he was receiving daily update on leishmania situation and as of Monday 2230 cases were reported to him. He said there was no need for panic, as the disease was mostly due to dry weather and self-limiting in nature.

Experts on the other hand maintain that the disease with about 20 species is transmitted by bites of sand flies and through the reservoirs of wild animals e.g rodents, sloths etc. A more common form of leishmania known as Kala Azar is transmitted directly from humans to humans. Its treatment is difficult because of drug toxicity, long courses required and frequent need for hospitalization.

Sodium Stibogluconate, so far, is said to be the drug of choice in treatment of leshmania. In the US, the FDA has only recently approved use of AmBisome in certain cases. It is said that without treatment, case- fatality in leishmania cases can reach up to 90 per cent. According to the regional press, there are more than 4,500 existing cases of leshmania in the areas close to Balochistan.

Earlier the minister addressed a press conference at the Sindh Secretariat to highlight the ongoing population welfare activities of his department. He said that to meet the new target set by the President to bring down the existing growth rate of 2.1 per cent to 1.9 per cent by July 2003, a strategy based on effective organization, public motivation, and better utilization of NGOs resources through partnership would be put to practice in Sindh.

He said that his department would utilize the services of private medical practitioners, homeopaths, Hakeems, clinics and hospitals in motivating people towards birth control.

He said that the Sindh health department had already achieved the target set under the 9th five-year plan (1998-2003) to reduce the growth rate from 2.6 per cent to 2.1 per cent.

He said his department’s objective was to raise the contraceptive prevalence rate from 28.5 per cent in 1998 to 42.5 per cent by July 2003.

He announced setting up of monthly contraceptive surgery (CS) camps throughout the province. In the first series starting from Feb 2, 16 CS camps will be organised in different areas of the interior of Sindh. More than 225 operations were held at a pilot CS camp at Hyderabad on Monday, which the minister said was a record.