LAHORE, June 23: The government needs to come up with a concrete policy to prevent and control hepatitis.

This was stated by Health Minister Dr Tahir Javed while speaking at the inaugural session of a two-day seminar on hepatitis jointly organized by the health ministry, the health department and the World Health Organization, here on Monday.

The minister said the core group working on the planning for prevention and control of hepatitis should come up with a final document of recommendations within three weeks.

He said the health department was already preparing a draft legislation to regulate private medical colleges, hospitals, clinics and laboratories. The prevention and control of hepatitis policy would also be implemented under the to be approved legislation, he said.

He said hepatitis was a major public health issue and prevention was only a workable remedy. The Punjab government could not vaccinate all adults as being campaigned by some pharmaceutical companies. He said his department with the help of GAVI had, however, started vaccination of infants against Hepatitis-B in 2001.

As the government alone could not control the spread of hepatitis, he said, active measures needed to be taken by both the public and private sector, including NGOs, to create awareness about the causes and prevention from the disease.

He said an awareness campaign also needed to be launched in print and electronic media.

As there was no vaccine available for Hepatitis-C, he said, the deadly disease could only be controlled by taking precautionary measures, including blood screening before transfusion, proper sterilization of medical and dental tools, implementation of infection control practices and promotion of behaviour changes among the general public and healthcare workers.

The minister said the health department would also contact the Haj ministry and discuss the issue of mass shaving of heads at the time of Haj.

He said the repeated use of blades while mass shaving could prick and cause hepatitis.

Earlier, 11 experts presented their papers on different issues related to the awareness, prevention and control of hepatitis.